^ 



- 



The Great Mother 

A Gospel of the Eternally-Feminine 

Occult and Scientific Studies and Experiences 
in the Sacred and Secret Life 



:.<jwa/bj 



j BY 



JERREGAARD 



CHIEF OF THE MAIN READING ROOM. 
NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY 

Author of "Mysticism and Nature- Worship " — "A Sufi Interpretation of Omar Khayyam 

and Fitzgerald" — "Jesus, a Poet, a Prophet, a Mystic and a Man of Freedom" — 

"The Inner Life and the Tao-Teh-King," &c, &c, &c. 



WITH CHAPTERS BY 

EUGENIE R. ELISCU. M. D., WILLIAM F. FRAETAS, 
GRACE GALLATIN SETON 



Nature is a Presence felt everywhere. 

Call that Presence the Great Mother and you do right. 



THE INNER-LIFE PUBLISHING CO. 
541 WEST 124TH STREET. NEW YORK, N. Y., U. S. A. 






COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY MATHILDE GEORGINE BJERREGAARD 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



©CI.A357949 



DEDICATED TO 

THE HIGHPRIESTESS OF THE GREAT MOTHER 



CONTENTS 



I 

The Nature-Mystery of the Great Mother 

Address and Prayer — A Mystery unveiled — The Doctrine of the Great 
Mother is the Doctrine of the Unitive Way — Not "escape" but "attain- 
ment" — The Natural man — Thomas a Kempis — The Senses and the Sense 
world — The Presence — Visions are not Presence — Rousseau — Nature and 
Humanity — Nature, a Sphinx and cruel — Conquest of Nature — In har- 
mony with Nature — Where and how we meet Nature, the Great Mother — 
Nature and the Great Mother — Nature, Theology and the Great Mother — 
Behind the Veil — Nature a system of nuptials. 

The meaning of the Eternally-Feminine — Goethe on Nature — The 
Eternally-Feminine, the Central Will — The Christ and the Eternally- 
Feminine — The Feminine Principle is double — Man, Woman and the 
Eternally-Feminine — The Hebrews, the Torah and the Feminine — Is the 
Eternally-Feminine manifest? Is a science of Woman possible? — God as 
Person, Animism and the Great Mother — Vital Force and the Great 
Mother — The Great Mother is the Power of Life — The Great Mother's 
Gift to her children. Love, the Leveller and the Uplifter, by Grace Gallatin 
Seton — Mothering the Race, by Eugenie R. Bliscu, M. D. 

A short review of Nature poetry: Wordsworth, Fiona Macleod, 
Swinburne, Richard Jefferies, Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Maurice de 
Guerin — Illusions and the Great Mother — Cruelty in Nature and the Great 
Mother — Evil, the Martyrdom of Man and the Great Mother — Death and 
the Great Mother — Life and Death as a process — Triumph of Death. 



II 

The Beauty and Art-Mystery of the Great Mother 
(In three chapters) 



Ill 

The Religious Mystery of the Great Mother 

Invocation — Religion and Revelation — Nature-Mysticism and the 
Great Mother — The Senses — The mystical side of Nature — Nature, a Bible, 
not falsified and spoiled — St. Francis and Love of the Organic world — 
Romanticism and Communion with Nature — Family relationship with 
Nature — Nature, a Comforter and Liberator — Nature and Art — The Great 
Mother's love for fourfoldness — The Mystery of Color and Tone in rela- 
tion to the Great Mother, by William F. Fraetas — The Great Mother and 
Air, Water, Earth, Fire — Nature-Mystics and Animals and Plants — 
Nature-Spirits — The Great Mother and the Dance — The Yearly Dance — 
Christmas vibrations — Easter — Summer or the Mundane Tree — The Brown 
and Red Leaves — The Dance month by month — Wild Nature, early Chris- 
tians and the Great Mother — The Landscape and the Great Mother's Face 
— Modern Nature-feeling. 

Nature-worship — Being, the Great Mother — Nature or the Great 
Mother in Sufism — A Hindu religious enthusiast on Nature — Mythology 
and the Great Mother — The Great Mother, the Myrionymous — Mother- 
goddesses — The Ancient Deities and the Great Mother — Naturam expellas 
furca, tamen usque recurret — Proteus and the Great Mother — Athene — 
Aphrodite — Here — Artemis — Hestia (Vesta) — Water-goddesses — Demeter- 
Proserpine — Gaia-Rhea — Semitic-Hebrew views of Nature — 'The Old 
Testament — The Book of Job — The Psalms — Christianity hostile to 
Nature — The Mother and the Son — Mary, the Mother of God — Madonnas 
and the Great Mother — Jesus in the Open. The preacher of the Eternally- 
Feminine — Jesus and the natural rhythm of Palestine — Jesus and the 
Beauty of the Great Mother — Why did Jesus not call any woman apostles? 
— Jesus and His first disciples — Jesus as a teacher of Art — Anti-artistic 
spirit of Ecclesiasticism — L' envoy. 



I. 
THE NATURE-MYSTERY 

OF 

THE GREAT MOTHER 
» 

We can never have too much of Nature. — Thoreau. 



To the Most High Nature 

Oh! Great Mother: "Thy testimonies are wonderful; there- 
fore, my soul hath sought them" (Ps. cxv). "I have meditated 
and thought on these things, and left them in writing" (Eccl. 
xxxviii). 

To My Reader 

"If thou knowest not nor hast heard" (Is. xl), — "come and 
behold the works: the earth's beauty proclaims the Most-High 
Mother!" 

"The children of men, 
Whom Nature's works can charm, with Godliness 
Hold converse." 
Let me point you to the "cloud of witnesses" everywhere 
showing greatness and glory! 

"Beautiful world 
Shining around me; 
Manifold, million hued! — 
Wonders confound me! 
From earth, sea, and starry sky, 
Meadows and mountains, 
Eagerly gushes 
Life's magical fountains. 
Thou quick-teeming world, 
Though scoffers may blame thee, 
I admire and worship 
The God, who did frame thee: 
The Great Mother." 



A Mystery Unveiled 

All manifestations are necessarily masculine in character. 
It is so their nature. All appearance is in shape and there can 
be no appearance without shape. It is so its law. But this 
fact can not be demonstrated and need not be; it is its own 
demonstration. The very unfolding of the mind is demonstra- 
tion and verification. Every mind sees the truth for itself and 
by itself. 

Life can not be demonstrated. It is. Its being is an immedi- 
ate fact. Any attempted demonstration makes Life an appear- 
ance or presents it as a manifestation and can do no more. 
When the mind will demonstrate Divinity, for instance, it makes 
it appear, or reveals it, as it is called. That is all it can do. No 
appearance covers the fullness of life. It is limited by the 
mind's character or quality and can be no more than mind. 

Inasmuch as all mind manifestations or appearances are by 
an inner necessity masculine in character, so Divinity can only 
be demonstrated as being masculine. And so it has been in the 
past. Divinity is always presented as masculine. And it is still 
so that Divinity can not be presented except as masculine, (be- 
cause the mind is masculine and works masculine). 

But while our presentation of Divinity is by an inner necessity 
masculine, our inner perceptions are not. They are neither 
masculine nor feminine but inasmuch as our perceptions are 
feminine in quality, the Inner-Life inclines to perceive the 
Divine as feminine. And it was so in the past. It takes very 
little ingenuity to see that all the non-social religions (and they 
are the true religions) perceived the Divine under form of 
Femininity. Even in Christianity it is the case. The Holy XtC0/~* 
Spirit is called masculine, yet the office, the work, the quality 
of the Holy Spirit is feminine, viz., a Comforter. 

When we are roused religiously we immediately become fern- ft}/- J£ D t ti > 
inine in our attitudes, viz., we devote ourselves to others, we r- 
sacrifice ourselves, we submit, etc., etc., all of which is feminine 
and demonstrates the inner quality of religion. 

In the Mysteries this was understood and taught. Later 
social religions have destroyed the ancient wisdom and with the 
ever increasing outwardness of civilization, the Truth has been 



2 THE GREAT MOTHER 

forgotten and religion — such as it is — is without the Inner-Life 
power. It may properly be asked : Have we any religion ? 

Let us come back to the true core of religion! Let us read 
our Scriptures so that for Masculinity we either substitute 
Femininity or see Masculinity as merely a mind-form of the 
Feminine. By so doing we shall come to an at-one-ment of the 
Inner and the Outer, and life shall be lived in Truth. 

In this book I have dealt with the Feminine which lies back 
of and is the power of the Masculine. The Feminine has been 
shown to be the cause and power. The Masculine is form and 
shape. 

The Doctrine of the Great Mother is the Doctrine of the Unitive Way 

As soon as mankind learns that its theories are only mascu- 
line mentalities and bare forms without the eternal life within 
them as their motives, then mankind shall come to the true life 
and no more be harassed by doubt and driven by every wind of 
doctrine hither and thither. The Mystics know this and have 
realized it in full measure. 

The doctrine of the Great Mother gives life abundant and 
"more abundant life" because it raises us out of phenomenal 
extremes and thereby it gives us "the great active" force, which, 
if we use it, establishes all the heart's desires on the firmest 
possible foundation. 

The "unitive way" does not destroy those realities which men 
cling to. It puts them in their true light and gives them their 
true value. It destroys all illusions created by the mind. 



Like Light running through all the colors of the spectrum, 
yet also existing outside and at both ends of it, so the names for 
Nature run from extremes to extremes, apparently the most 
contradictory. With names follow conceptions or vice versa, 
hence opposite views of the Great Mother follow each other in 
my collection, all however having the same background, like the 
colors which all are light in their essences. The reason for this 
fact is to be sought in the complexity and inherent richness of 
the subject. Whether I use the term Nature, the Eternally- 
Feminine or the Great Mother, the subject is the same, and it is 



the great mother 3 

an eternal one, probably not yet exhausted, nor ever to be 
exhausted, because of its inherent quality. 

I have arranged my collection under the four main headings, 
which always present themselves when an eternal subject is 
discussed, (i) The natural, (2) The aesthetic, (3) The philo- 
sophical and (4) The religious aspect; but space forbids me, 
much to my regret, to extend the third, the philosophical, beyond 
a few statements. 

Under none of the headings have I been able to place anything 
more than just enough to indicate the subject. It would have 
been easy to extend the scope from the abundance of material 
I have collected in the thirty odd years I have been busy with 
the subject. Space also forbids any extended elaboration of con- 
necting thoughts between the paragraphs. My style and treat- 
ment is therefore both irregular and abrupt in many places. 
My readers can not feel that more keenly than I myself. My 
daily duties and limited time must be one of my excuses. 

Not " Escape," but "Attainment " 

Our relation to the Great Mother's multiplicity should not be 
one of fear and desire to "escape." Oneness is not brought about 
by running away. Asceticism and doctrines of "escape" are 
conceptions born of weakness. The Occident seeks "attain- 
ment" or the at-one-ing of all opposites, contradictions and divers 
views. We, of the Occident, seek "attainment," that unity-ele- 
ment which all opposites contain and our "salvation" consists in 
a life on the "Unitive Way." 

Multiplicity is the Great Mother's way with us. It gives room 
at the table for all her children and allows all and each to choose 
for themselves the dishes they want, and, by that process all 
follow the law of their lives. Mother Nature teaches "attain- 
ment" and encourages us everywhere and at all times. I can 
not see that she ever teaches an "escape." Cowardice is not on 
her program. 

All the methods of "escape" defeat life's end and purpose. 
There is no meaning in life for us, if it is not of positive value, 
but is only negative. Human action can not be illusory; ulti- 
mately it is only explicable by the action of an eternal conscious- 



4 the great mother 

ness using brain, nerves, etc., as its organs and thus reproducing 
itself through them. 

"Attainment" gives salvation. "Escape" is temporary. Let 
us therefore try to "attain" to the Great Mother and not seek 
to "escape." 

This book has grown out of some lectures on the Great 
Mother, which I recently gave to small but select audiences. 
The lectures aimed at shifting the point of gravitation of most 
popular lectures from abstract thought to the concrete elements 
at bottom of the soul, because I think the American people is 
too subjective and intellectual and too easily satisfied with words 
and the glamor of words. There is need of more of that Object- 
iveness which answers the eternally recurrent questions "Who 
am I?" and "How do I find Myself?" and "What power can 
reconcile me to myself and my origin?" The answers to these 
questions, I have found in the realization of what and who the 
Eternal Mother is. That realization does not come in or by an 
intellectual process. It is an experience. When I have tried to 
express that experience in words, I have called it the Inner-Life 
and sometimes Mysticism. I prefer the term Inner-Life, and, by 
Mysticism, I usually mean the earth-form of the Inner-Life. 
But that "Mysticism" I speak of is not that hawked on the 
common intellectual platforms. It is that wonderful life lived 
by people who never called themselves Mystics, nor traded in 
glamor, but who from an inner necessity found themselves com- 
pelled to follow the Path of Suffering. 

In this book I mean by the Eternal Mother the personal reali- 
zation of the Deity as Mother. The Eternal Mother is not a god 
or goddess, but the power and ultimate-foundation of all gods, 
goddesses, Nature and Man: the Deity, both cause and effect. 

The Eternal Mother is not the feminine side of the manifested 
Deity or God, a conception common enough in the various great 
religious systems. The Eternal Mother is Nature or the Eter- 
nally-Feminine. But whatever definition, I may give, no defini- 
tion can convey the fulness of life suggested by the phrase the 
Eternal Mother. Any and all definitions are necessarily intellect- 
ual, and no form or effort of the intellect can contain the Infinite 
or the Deity. Nevertheless, in order to talk about the Infinite 



THE GREAT MOTHER 5 

or the Deity, it becomes necessary to choose some intellectual 
form. 

I have chosen as my intellectual form for the Deity this term, 
The Eternal Mother, The Great Mother. The contents of my 
book will show why; and fully, I hope, demonstrate how much 
richer the conception The Eternal Mother is than The Eter- 
nal Father. My book will also show that which lies in the con- 
ception Father. 

My book is a re-reading of past learning and a bold interpre- 
tation of it. I proceed on the idea that the past has not expressed 
itself correctly by calling the Divine exclusively Father or imper- 
sonally Nature. I re-translate many of such conceptions and re- 
state them in terms of the Great Mother and I claim that I am jus- 
tified in doing so by the fact that a closer examination will show 
that Femininity has been expressed wrongly in the past, what- 
ever the cause may have been. The Great Mother conception is 
the sum total of mythology and also its beginning. Back of all 
masculine conceptions lies the Feminine. An immanent Deity 
was realized before a transcendental god was thought of or could 
be thought of. Realizations of origins precede ideas of their 
cause. The philosophical anima mundi or Worldsoul is a per- 
sonal not an impersonal conception. The Great Mother is the 
soul's own Intensity and that Intensity in objective form. 

I claim that the Great Mother idea is the true foundation of all 
spiritual life ; its starting point, the root of religion and the power 
of art. 

My subtitle : "A gospel of the Eternally-Feminine" is justified 
by the forgone. The Eternally-Feminine can be none other than 
the Great Mother such as I have developed the idea.* 

Finally, I call my book "studies and experiences" and so it is. 
The subject has been in my thoughts ever since I awakened to 
be a man and the numerous "occult" remarks I make in interpret- 
ing my subject are truly founded in experiences of the most 



* Recently reports have come from the Pennsylvania University Museum that Dr. 
Arno Poebel has translated some of the tablets dug up in Nippur and the translations 
reveal the fact that it was a female deity who created mankind. She was coeval with 
two male ruler gods, but later tablets speak of these two gods as unimportant. Her 
name was Nintu and mankind is called ■' the black headed " (from the color of the hair). 
If this shall be verified by further translations, we have at least one literal statement 
about the creator being a woman. 



the: great mother 



divers kinds. By experiences I mean Inner-Life realizations. 
The three chapters by rny friends were written by request and 
are expressions of their experiences and philosophy. 



My work may be called an essay in natural theology, but I am 
not opposing Revelation nor trying to substitute Immanence for 
Transcendence. But I do away with Theology, of whatever 
name it is, when it denies its own root and argues in the abstract. 
It has denied the Great Mother ! 

The Great Mother Nature has not received any death-blow by 
Darwin. She has designs and they are patent enough. Nor has 
Kant's rationalism done away with her and her plans and pur- 
poses. Our own day has an ever growing and profounder view 
of Nature than the past ages, and I am expressing the spirit of 
that reconstruction which is going on in religion. And I expect 
to hear harmonious expressions from my critics and not opposi- 
tion. I use old phraseology but in newer senses. I lean to the 
Mystics and to all Inner-Life people and all that practical ideal- 
ism which happily is so common in our day where the Academ- 
icians do not speak or write. 

The Academicians will have no use for my work and will not 
appreciate my endeavors. But I am reconciled to that for the 
present. In the future they will probably learn from Nature her- 
self to open their doors for fresh air and sunlight. They must 
sooner or later accept the modern concepts of Nature which em- 
phasize the homogenity of Nature, its identical structure and 
operation in all its parts, stellar as well as mundane. And when 
that has happened the Academicians will speak of the Great 
Mother. 



I define Nature as the Great Mother and that implies the idea 
that Nature is a continuity, a single system of forces. I am op- 
posed to all ideas of a break in the phenomena we observe. My 
exposition presupposes the law expressed by the principle natura 
non facit saltum, Nature makes no leap. I have on my side all 
the philosophical schools of Naturalism, Idealism and Monism and 
the religions which have not lost their character by ecclesiasti- 



the; great mother 7 

cism. Poetry and practically all aesthetic systems view Nature 
as the Great Mother, like I do. 

The word Nature has always had a wide and vague sense 
though its general meaning has been that of a principle which 
explains the world.* It is in this latter sense I use the term. But 
I have tried to gather as many subsenses as the word will carry. 
I have quoted subjects which are mechanical and material as well 
as those which are dynamic and productive, and, I have shown 
how the word is used in relation to those subjects. I have quoted 
authors who use the word to distinguish the world from God and 
also authors who do not distinguish the two. 

With preference I have myself used the term Nature for the 
Ultimate Cause and when so doing I have called "God" the work- 
master, the Demiurgos and I have done so with the hope of seeing 
the terms "Nature" and "God" translated in the future as "the 
Great Mother" and "Workmaster." 

Instead of meaning "the whole world" by Nature, I use the 
term the Great Mother for "the whole world" and also for the 
cause and upholder of it. Nature or the Great Mother is to me 
both the eternal and permanent fact as also the transciency of 
that fact. Nature is to me and my presentation both physical 
and psychic, both living and material. 

The Natural Man and the Great Mother 

What is meant by the "natural man" ? 

Already before the Christian dualism arose, a problem had 
arisen in pagan thought : that of Reason and Nature. For some, 
the two were identical; with others, they were contrasted. In 
Christian thought the problem became acute. The "natural state" 
of man came to mean and means that state into which man falls 
when he is completely divorced from the divine life. It means 
he is carnal, base, worldly. 

Common sense, sound religious thought and a devout inter- 
pretation alike protest against such a meaning. To make the 
"natural man" so completely severed from the Divine is against 
the idea of God's goodness and His work which "was very good." 
In God we live, move and have our being. To condemn the 
"natural" man and to make divinity in us dependent upon the 



8 THE GREAT MOTHER 

church idea, for instance, is an empty abstraction, a fiction, an 
error. It has resulted in that terrible dogmatic sentence extra 
ecclesiam non esse hominibus salutem, and also in the denial of 
the possibility of moral life outside of civil society. 

The utter absurdity of the condemnation of the "natural" man 
may be seen in the "Imitation" by Thomas a Kempis. His 
chapter is headed: "Of the different stirrings of Nature and 
Grace." This is what he says : 

"Nature is crafty, and seduceth many, ensnareth and deceiveth 
them, and always proposeth herself for her end and object; 

— is unwilling and loth to die, or to be kept down or to be 
overcome, or to be in subjection, or readily to be subdued; 

— striveth for her own advantage, and considereth what profit 
she may reap of another; 

— willingly receiveth honor and reverence; 

— feareth shame and contempt; 

— loveth leisure and bodily ease ; 

— seeketh to have things that are curious and beautiful, and 
abhorreth those which are cheap and coarse ; 

— respecteth temporal things, rejoiceth at earthly gain, sor- 
roweth for loss, is irritated by every little injurious word; 

— is covetous, doth more willingly receive than give, and 
loveth to have things private and her own ; 

— inclineth a man to the creature, to his own flesh, to vanities, 
and to wandering hither and thither ; 

— is willing to have some outward solace, whereby she may 
receive delight of the senses ; 

— turneth everything to her own gain and profit, she cannot 
bear to do anything without reward, but for every kindness she 
hopeth to obtain either what is equal, or what is better, or at 
least praise or favor; and is very earnest to have her works and 
gifts much valued ; 

— rejoiceth to have many friends and kinsfolk; she glorieth 
of noble place and noble birth, she smileth on the powerful, 
f awneth upon the rich, applaudeth those who are like herself ; 

— quickly complaineth of want and of trouble ; 

— referreth all things to herself, striveth and argueth for her- 
self ; 



THE GREAT MOTHER 9 

— is eager to know secrets, and to hear news ; she loveth to ap- 
pear abroad and to make proof of many things by her own 
senses; she desireth to be acknowledged, and to do things for 
which she may be praised and admired ; 

— the more Nature is depressed and subdued, the better." 

I do not recognize any truths in the above definitions. Nature 
is not distorted, nor is the "natural" man carnal, base and radically 
evil. Thomas a Kempis and his followers use the wrong lan- 
guage. They should speak about sinful human nature and de- 
based characters, etc. That is what they mean. 

That which is "natural" is that which is regular and normal 
and the word "natural" indicates the "original" character of 
things. It does not mean sensual. The natural and the sensual 
are two things and not identical. 

The Senses and the Sense- World 

When I speak of Nature, I do not mean the sense-world. Na- 
ture is not sense nor illusion; is not to be denied and done away 
with, but to be discovered and obeyed. The sense-world is of 
our making; it is no more than the phantastic shapes we give to 
our desires. It has no reality. It is Maya, Evil and Falsity. 

But while we say the sense-world is illusory and false, we 
should not condemn the senses. Nature comes to us in rhythmic 
form and in the senses. By the senses and the mind we get a 
full and complete understanding of Nature. The senses are a 
submerged world to most people and must be re-discovered. 
They are Nature personally expressed in man ; Nature's Form in 
Man. "In the senses of the body, Nature mirrors herself to the 
mind,"* and "the human body is the highest blossom of all or- 
ganizations." But, of course, Krause did not mean those chains 
that hold perverted man in prison. 

As for the senses, this is the key; Said the poet: "a bird flew 
across my path in the woods and I prayed, 'come to my embrace; 
kiss my mouth and leave your yearnings upon my lips.' An- 
swered the bird; 'My soul is song in your breast; myself you do 
not catch.' " 

We worship progressive Nature; Nature full of stimulation; 



V 



* K. C. T. Krause, " The Ideal of Humanity " (Edinburgh, 1900). 



10 THE GREAT MOTHER 

full of bearing power. Mary bearing the Son is the type and as 
such she is Natura naturans. 

But we do not worship or rest with Nature of yesterday, Na- 
ture decaying, natura naturata, matter. Nature in that form is 
only an illusion, is astral and demonic. Natura naturata is ex- 
hausted, dead and stationary. 

Wherever we see anything which we call stationary and fixed 
we make a mistake in seeking it. Everything permanent is 
against us, because we cannot develop an independent character 
by it. It is in our way. 

Let us seek the new, the exhuberent youthful energy. That 
is the Mother Nature whom we will worship. She is increasingly 
renewing herself and us. She is doing that when she unveils her- 
self or rolls off the wrappings she discarded yesterday. In her 
wrapped up or veiled condition she does not push us ahead. 

To test Nature and the impulses from Nature, apply Goethe's 
words and you shall not be in doubt : "Das ist die Eigenshaf t des 
Geistes, dass er den geist ewig anregt," "It is the character of 
the Spirit, that He (It) constantly stirs up (or stimulates) our 
spirit." If Nature does not stimulate or stir up, she is not the 
Great Mother, I speak of, but merely matter. And is not 
Presence. 

If Nature is no more to us than continuously solid and divisible 
into tangible parts, then we are not in the Presence, but touch 
matter. Matter has no active power and is not vocal with re- 
demption. 

Matter is always the same, though it may be masked in various 
combinations. ^Energy is constantly changing the form in which 
it presents itself. The one is the eternal, unchangeable Fate or 
necessitas of the ancients; the other is Proteus, the Eternal 
Mother. 

The Presence 

Let us quit the dictionary and the wisdom of the intellect; 
they can not fathom Nature or the Great Mother. Let us try 
ourselves, our perceptions, etc., and see if they, as dictionaries, 
do not hold much wider information. 

My reader ! What do you look for in the world around you ? 
Do you enjoy the beauty in the world or does it not hold any 



THE GREAT MOTHER II 

beauty for you? Did you ever perceive anything personal or 
akin to yourself in leaves and pebbles? Did Nature ever solicit 
your company? Was there a Divine Heart in the raindrop that 
fell upon you? Did you ever find yourself in the Presence of a 
great Unknown, yet beneficient power, a Presence, 

"Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 
And the round ocean, and the living air, 
And the blue sky, and in the Mind of Man"? 

A Presence, which "rolls through all things," and makes "the 
whole world feel akin"; a Presence, which, though incompre- 
hensible, nevertheless, "stares thee, in rock, bush, river, in the 
face." A Presence which circulates "from link to link" ; which 
is the "Soul of all the worlds" ; a Presence which is not for the 
poet alone, but for all, who are full of a "deep love of Nature." 
A Presence, which fills us "with the joy of elevated thoughts" 
and so impresses us "with quietness and beauty," "that all which 
we behold is full of blessings," and reveals, indeed, a Mind and a 
Heart. If you have felt such a Presence you have communed 
with the Great Mother. And, if so, you can understand what 
I am going to write. 

In such a perception of Presence lies a realization of Divinity 
which existed in you as a peculiar life long before reflection, and 
it is infinitely more valuable to you than any reflective thought 
and its results. It builds for Life. 

Richard Watson Gilder sang of the Presence: 

A power there is that trembles through the earth; 

It lives in Nature's mirth, 

Making that fearful as the touch of pain; 

It strikes the sun-lit plain, 

And harvests flash, or bend with rushing rain; 

It is not far when tempests make their moan, 

And lightnings leap, and falls the thunderstone ; 

It comes in morning's beam of living light, 

And the imperial night 

Knows it and all its company of stars, 

And the auroral bars. 

Through Nature all, the subtile current thrills; 

It built in flood and fire the crystal hills; 



12 THE GREAT MOTHER 

It moulds the flowers, 

And all the branched forests that abide 

Forever on the teeming mountain-side. 

It lives where music times the soft, processional hours ; 

And where on that lone hill of art 

Proud Phidias carved in stone his lyric heart; 

And where wild battle is, and where 

Glad lovers breathe in starry night the quivering air. 

In that song, the poet made his confession of faith in the Great 
Mother. It is to be lamented that he preferred the impersonal 
form of expression rather than the personal. 

As Nature-worshippers we do not ask to be saved, we pray 
for the Presence, we ask "manifest thyself !" By the Presence 
we shall be regenerated. We have been told that we shall 
be saved by faith, by philosophy, by art and the Beautiful — 
we will none of them, they are not personal enough! 

But Visions are not Presence 

What if earth 
Be but the shadow of heav'n ; and things therein 
Each to other like, more than on earth is thought.* 

This was Milton's vision, but no realization of Presence. 

Schlegel perceived that "Nature is a book written on both 
sides, within and without, in which the finger of God is distinctly 
visible ; a species of Holy Writ in a bodily form : a glorious pane- 
gyric on God's omnipresence expressed in the most visible sym- 
bols." 

The churchfather, Tertulian (De res. 12) was not very far 
from the Mother : "All things in Nature are prophetic outlines of 
divine operations, God not merely speaking parables, but doing 
them." 

Without the direct experience these men saw the temple of the 
Great Mother. Nature is her temple, yea her own body. "The 
hills rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun" are her plastic forms 
and "the vales stretching in pensive quietness through the still 
lapse of ages" are passionate manifestations of basic forces. 



* J. Milton, Paradise I^ost, v. 574/6. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 13 

Rousseau 

Rousseau is a disappointment in many ways. He has not given 
us anything clear about Nature objectively considered. He 
speaks in the main about his feelings, his sentiments. From his 
expressions it seern^ that he realized Nature as Will. Will moves 
everything and animates all. Will implies intelligence, he thought. 
He seems to have perceived the Great Mother as willing, acting, 
choosing and judging, but he did not comprehend her designs. 
He wrote : "my spontaneous attitude towards this Being (the 
Great Mother) is that of a feeling of awe and gratitude; and, 
according to a simple dictate of Nature herself, I worship this 
Being." 

When I argue a "return" to Nature, I do not speak in the sense 
of Rousseau or about a return to his ideas. 

Nature and Humanity 

If a distinction is to be made between Nature and Humanity, 
then such an one is easily made. Humanity is part of Nature, but 
a separate and distinct power and existence and the crown. But 
Humanity is at present, and, on this earth at least, located in and 
largely dependent upon Nature. The future belongs to Nature- 
people, the Great Mother's pet children, if I may say so. 

Nature-people, people from the soil, are primitive, that is, 
simpler, less sophisticated, more naive than city people, the people 
of culture and civilization. They stand nearer the morning of the 
world. They are less refined because they inherit fewer tradi- 
tions, less thought, less knowledge. They are childlike and like 
children, often deceitful and mistaken, but never full of illusions 
or sentimental. They go straight to the point both in questions 
and answers. Their directness is often embarrassing and un- 
pleasant to culture people, though it brings with it lucidity, con- 
creteness and disillusions. They are truthful in the sense of seek- 
ing the facts, the Real. They never pose, or indulge in pathos 
or affectation. The clear light they live in often brings with it 
coldness and hardness in its tone. They are seldom rich in varia- 
tions or sympathies. Feeling might be said to be an unknown 
quality to them. As for love, it is with them primarily and prin- 
cipally "physical" ; it may be called a passion of body which per- 



14 THE GREAT MOTHER 

colates through the whole personality and colors wit, imagination 
and all activities. But we must not pass too harsh a judgment on 
them for that. Their love is not lust. It is usually a family tie 
and we know how strong the genealogical sense is with many and 
has been in the past. It has often no supernatural character. It 
is often only desire and a desire-life, not symbolical or poetic, but 
not debasing or debased. 

The Great Mother begins all her developments with Nature- 
people. They are natural in the true sense of the word. 

Directness has been said to mean keeping the feet on the earth, 
to shrink from Mysticism, to be concrete and definite, not to 
dwell on the "imaginary" qualities of things, to see things naked, 
to keep the eye on them, to avoid sentimentalism, in fine, to have 
the outlook on life of a simple, naive, childlike mind. This is true, 
but people of directness do not ignore the infinite mystery of 
things; they only avoid the vague emotions which hover on the 
verge of consciousness. By directness we gain a keen sense of 
the beauty and interest of the ordinary simple things around us. 
And surely we ought not loose ourselves in somnambulism nor in 
sordid detail. We shall joy in simple things and learn their secret 
of sincerity. No opium eating must be ours. Hence the value of 
directness and naturalness. 

Our relation to Nature is this. We can never — as long as we 
live in Nature — cease to be part of the All-Nature, but at the 
same time we separate more and more from Nature. We seek 
into or among Nature phenomena. The eighteenth century 
humanized Nature. The nineteenth century has tried to natural- 
ize man but without success. The differentiation is going on. Yet 
we of the twentieth century differentiate from Nature in a very 
different way from the older Mystics. We assert ourselves. 
They wished to flee Nature because afraid of her. We work with 
Nature and the result is a new Humanity is coming to be. The 
new Humanity is that of the Great Mother's making. 

Our attitude toward Nature is often falsely defined. In one 
aspect we must do all we can to adapt our organism to the en- 
vironment. By so doing we gain power, because our organism 
is already, at the moment we start, an adaptation, superior in 
quality to the environment and therefore ahead of it. 



the; great mother 15 

In another aspect we should adapt the environment to our 
organism, impossible as that at first sight may seem. But it 
is not impossible. It is being done. We build houses, train ani- 
mals, transform plants and even compel inorganic nature to do 
our bidding. Industry is the result. And so it has been ever 
since the crudest beginning of art and culture. In all this there 
appears a design, a method which has a personal foundation. 
The Great Mother is behind that method. 

Nature a Sphinx and Cruel 

I have in another chapter spoken about the Sphinx, to which 
I now refer and add the following: 

The Sphinx with the cruel claws of a lion and the teeming 
breasts of a woman is the eternal parable of Nature. She is 
equally equipped to tear, to rend, to kill and to produce and 
nourish. Her stony gaze both repels and attracts. Do not the 
savages know this? Do they not know of ruthless and inexor- 
able forces and of the survival of the fittest? It is among our- 
selves only, we the people of culture, ( !) that the weak are 
allowed to survive. 

How terribly actual Nature is! She has no concern with 
possibilities and potentialities; they are not her concern. She 
does not promise. She is unmindful and careless of debt and 
her pathway is full of failures and calamities. She has no 
emotion. If a small child plays upon the borders of a deep water, 
she does not prevent it from falling in and drowning. She does 
not care if the child is illegitimate, a mother's darling or a 
father's hope. They say Nature has no morals, but they talk 
ignorantly. Nature does not act according to the Catechism, 
to be sure, but she has laws far beyond the understanding of 
the Catechism. Of this I have written in another division of 
this book. 

Here is a fitting place for John Stuart Mills' terrible arraign- 
ment. In his Posthumous Essays he wrote: "In sober truth, 
nearly all the things which men are hanged or imprisoned for 
doing to one another, are Nature's every day performances. 
Killing, the most criminal act recognized by human laws, Nature 
does once to every being that lives, and in a large proportion of 
cases, after protracted torture such as only the greatest monsters 



V 



1 6 the great mother 

whom we read of ever purposely inflicted on their living fellow- 
creatures . Nature impales men, breakes them as if on the 

wheel, casts them to be devoured by wild beasts, burns them to 
death, crushes them with stones like the first Christian martyr, 
starves them with hunger, freezes them with cold, poisons them 
by the quick or slow venom of her exhalations, and has hun- 
dreds of other hideous deaths in reserve, such as the ingenious 

cruelty of a Domitian never surpassed . She mows down 

those on whose existence hangs the wellbeing of a whole people, 
perhaps the prospects of the human race, for generations to 
come, with as little compunction as those whose death is a re- 
lief to themselves, or a blessing to those under their noxious 
influence. Such are Nature's dealings with life. Even when she 
does not intend to kill, she inflicts the same tortures in apparent 
wantonness. In the clumsy provision which she has made for 
that perpetual renewal of animal life, rendered necessary by the 
. prompt termination she puts to it in every individual instance, 
no human being ever comes into the world but another human 
being is literally stretched on the rack for hours or days, not 
infrequently issuing in death. — Next to taking life (equal to it 
according to a high authority) is taking the means by which we 
live; and Nature does this too on the largest scale and with 
the most callous indifference. A single hurricane destroys the 
hopes of a season; a blight of locusts, or an inundation, deso- 
lates a district; a trifling chemical change in an edible root 
starves a million of people. The waves of the sea like banditti 
seize and appropriate the wealth of the rich, and the little all 
of the poor, with the same accompaniments of stripping, wound- 
ing, and killing, as their human anti-types. Everything, in short, 
which the worst men commit either against life or property, is 

perpetrated on a larger scale by natural agents . Even the 

love of 'order,' which is thought to be a following of the ways 
of Nature, is in fact a contradiction of them. All which people 
are accustomed to deprecate as 'disorder,' and its consequences, 
is precisely a counterpart of Nature's ways. Anarchy and the 
Reign of Terror are overmatched in injustice, ruin, and death, 
by a hurricane and a pestilence." 

And as an answer, the words of Turgenief are apropos. In 
his "Poems in Prose," he makes Mother Nature say : "Reason — 



the; great mother 17 

Good — Justice? — Those are the words of men. I know neither 
good nor evil. Reason is no law to me — and what is justice? 
I have given thee life, — I take it away and give it to others, 
whether worms or men ... it makes no difference to me — ." 

No doubt the words of John Stuart Mills are strong and have 
many facts to rest upon, yet Nature may be conquered. 

Conquest of Nature 

Nature is by her own volition so constituted, that when she is 
satiated, shfLJsdthdraws from her lover to live alone till she shall 
have brought forth her child, a new transformation of herself. 
She does at large exactly as she does in the lower, the animal 
kingdom, where the female after conception turns against the 
male and fights him off. We say about ourselves when a reaction 
in feeling sets in that we recover ourselves and return to a 
rational attitude. But the truth is, we do not recover. Nature 
recovers herself in us, or simply changes her mode of existence, 
because it so suits her; because she does only one thing at the 
time, and does it well. After she has reproduced herself, she 
will again and again come forth and play with herself, or, as we 
say, match the Feminine with the Masculine. Thus Nature 
lives her life all day long and thus she spends her nights. This 
is her own kingdom and she exercises freely her power to draw 
Man into it and hold him captive in her embrace. If he be lost 
to his higher interests, it is solely his own fault, for Nature does 
not exercise any absolute power over him. She acts so that she 
must defeat her own ends, where these would bring evil to man. 
She is so constituted by herself that, though the dull wheel of 
existence turns forever on its axis and carries no burden that 
does Nature any good, it is bound every time it goes around the 
dial to pass the spots provided by herself and where she calls 
to man, that here he may make his escape and by "denying" Na- 
ture free himself. 

This shows a law of Nature and where we may conquer. 

In Harmony with Nature 

Does a "return to Nature" imply "harmony with Nature"? 
Mathew Arnold says No ! 



l8 THE GREAT MOTHER 

"In Harmony with Nature" ? Restless fool, 
Who with such heat doth preach what were to thee, 
When true, the last impossibility — 
To be like Nature strong, like Nature cool ! 

Know, man hath all which Nature hath, but more, 
And in that more lie all his hopes of good. 
Nature is cruel, man is sick of blood ; 
Nature is stubborn, man would fain adore; 

Nature is fickle, man hath need of rest; 
Nature forgives no debt, and fears no grave; 
Man would be mild, and with safe conscience blest. 

Man must begin, know this, where Nature ends ; 
Nature and Man can never be fast friends. 
Kool, if thou canst not pass her, rest her slave ! 

Where and How We Meet Nature, The Great Mother 

Silence and solitude have great and awful instructions if we 
only realized it. The fact is we are always in the Presence of a 
controlling, approving or disapproving power, whether we know 
it or not, whether we delight in it or ignore it. 

Silence and solitude are normal conditions and it should not 
be necessary "to retire" to them. That necessity only arises 
when conditions are low. The spiritual minded do not need "to 
retire" ; they are always in the Presence, both consciously and 
volitionally. 

"True hearts spread and heave 
Unto their God, as flowers do to the sun." 

Let us give the Divine Mother our first thought, that is the 
Inner-Life ! 

"Be still, my soul, be still ! 
Something that ear hath not heard, 
Something unknown to song of bird, 
Something unborn by wind, or wave, or star 
A message from the land afar 
Comes to thee, if thou art but still." 



THE GREAT MOTHER 19 

And the poet's declaration is true. Stillness reveals the es- 
sential, the fundamental, all that which is behind the phenomenal 
to which the senses have admission only. But it is a lost art 
nowadays, except for the few that seek and live the Inner-Life. 
In the quiet of the flight, the Silence also at times becomes elo- 
quent. Sometimes the Mother "tries us in the night" — giveth 
songs in the night" — "instructs us in the night" — Would that 
people held on to the Mother as did Jacob and would not let 
go before a blessing and the gift of silence and solitude ! 

Nehemiah could lift up his heart in prayer, and T get an im- 
mediate answer, too, while standing as cupbearer before the king 
and carrying on a conversation all the time. Silence and soli- 
tude are hoi; matters of time and space. All that is needed is 
that we "shut the door" of the phenomenal and that we ought 
to do anyway and at all time. The mystery of Nehemiah's condi- 
tion was simply this that! the Divine dwelt in him. He was not 
thinking. The Divine was present and that is the character of 
silence and solitude. The Divine is always present and when the 
call comes "Where dwellest Thou?" The answer is always 
"Come and see." But before people go and "see" they have 
fallen into distractions because they wished to. There was once 
a great festal gathering in Jerusalem. Towards evening "Every 
man went to his own house but Jesus went to the Mt. Olives." 
Jesus went into the Universal Life at that time. j\n olive leaf 
means peace and that the flood of manifoldness and distraction 
has subsided and that the Spirit of Presence is upon the land. 
We cannot be in doubt as to Jesu acts on the Mount. He prayed, 
i. e., He communed. A prayer is the mountain top of vision such 
as silence and solitude gives vision. And what is the nature of 
the vision? It is a "God's-eye view!" And that view means our 
transfiguration. 

The Divine has never promised to explain its mystery or give 
us lessons in metaphysics. The promise relates to revelation by 
nearness and that is realized in silence and solitude. Sings Ter- 
steegen : 

Hath not each heart a passion and a dream, 
Each, some companionship for ever sweet, 
And each, in saddest skies some silver gleam, 



20 the: great mother 

And each, some passing joy too faint and fleet, 
And each, a staff and stay, though frail it prove, 
And each, a face he fain would ever see ? 

And what have I ? — a glory and a calm, 
A life that is an everlasting psalm, 
A heaven of endless joy in Thee. 

This is the Inner-Life singing what it has realized in silence and 
solitude. In the refrain there is nothing of desire, nothing fleet- 
ing. The song is sung in "the spirit of adoption." It is the Great 
Mother's song in the heart. 

The ascending effort goes through the conditions of silence 
and solitude. There is nothing dynamic in knowledge; it is 
found in silence. 

Nature and the Great Mother 

I will now attempt intellectually to say who the Great Mother 
is. The attempt can only be a failure as far as giving an ex- 
planation that in any way can be compared to experience. But 
the attempt must be made by making an explanation of Nature. 

Nature means origin, the great womb out of which all things 
come as if of themselves. Nature is both the cause and the 
process of the proceeding of all things, corporeal and incorporeal, 
and there is nowhere anything which is not Nature. Nature is 
both past, present and future, an eternal Presence. 

But Nature is not merely a metaphysical principle. She is 
also the power of growth, the plastic force of existence; she de- 
velops all organisms and does it after her own pattern and she 
destroys them also and likewise after her own pattern and will. 
She may therefore be called the inherent necessity of all things. 
But necessity to her does not mean what we mean by fate or 
compulsion. She is the inherent order of all things as well as 
their freedom. All things find their freedom, or which is the 
same, their self-realization in her uniformity. Nature is change- 
able, spontaneous and irregular in the very midst of her uni- 
formity. 

Nature is not merely a metaphysical expression and the power 
of growth, Nature is also the form of the Great Mother even in 
mountains, seas, rivers, and the whole actual or real world as 



the great mother 21 

it lies before our senses and is not produced by artificial means 
of man. 

All man's products are artificial and only so far in truth as 
they are infilled with Nature or the Great Mother's energy. It 
is the Great Mother's Presence which gives Nature to all forms, 
institutions and shapes and preserves them from the forced, the 
conventional and the stunted. 

In man's world, too, Nature is the sine qua non. For him to 
be truly man, he must relate himself most vigorously to his 
Mother. His instinctive sense of justice, benevolence and of self 
preservation as well as his other aboriginal qualities and ten- 
dencies are her gift. The more natural his thought, feeling or 
action, the truer and more active his humanity. "One touch of 
Nature, makes the whole world akin." 

That which is thus true as regards mankind, is also true for 
individual man. Our personal dispositions, temperaments and 
innate character are inborn Nature or the Great Mother's Pres- 
ence in us, both for comfort and benefit as well as for the office, 
to which she has assigned us. They constitute our essential vi- 
tality, physically, mentally, morally and spiritually. 

That which I thus far have said about Nature is also said 
about the Great Mother. Intellectually I have transferred the 
characteristics of Nature to her. To prove the correctness of 
the method is useless. The intuitions of man must connect the 
two and experience must verify the assertions. No other argu- 
ments are of any value. Fundamental facts need no proofs, 
other than self -evidence. Self-evidence is a result of culture. 
The normal man may find a tongue in every flame, and hear 
a voice in every wave, the abnormal does not. 

Nature, Theology and the Great Mother 

Nature and man are God's two methods, so it is said. Nature's 
magic charm is her will to carry out law, design, plan and pur- 
pose. Her speech refrains with her own mystery. She is mys- 
tery to herself. Yet she is a kind of illuminated table of con- 
tents of Spirit, said Novalis. She can, however, not read that 
table herself. Everywhere she rests upon the supernatural and 
terminates in it, but she can not turn around and see where her 
roots strike. This is the declaration and philosophy of all dual- 



22 THE GREAT MOTHER 

istic thinking and therefore at the outset in conflict with the 
fundamental idea of my book. 

But the dualistic method can indeed be made useful, and I 
have used it. The following pages serve in full measure to 
characterize the Great Mother. The sayings which come from 
the great systems and from genius are largely mediate. I trans- 
fer them to the plane of immediateness, viz., into that sphere 
which is an experience, deeper than science and which needs no 
demonstration. I add to them that which intuition has to say 
and I take away from them that which is limited, biased and 
lacking reverence. 

Theology will admit that Nature is symbolic, orderly, pro- 
gressive towards the realization of ideals and exists for a pur- 
pose, an end. So far,' so good. That Nature is symbolic is 
evident from the fact that she can be approached by mind, con- 
sequently expresses thought. Every object in Nature is intellig- 
ible, real and rational. In this lies the possibility of science, 
discovery, invention, etc. This is admitted. 

That Nature is orderly or uniform and continuous under law 
is an axiom theology has taken over from science and the ex- 
pression suits theology's fundamental claim that Nature is cre- 
ated. Being created she must necessarily reflect the law of her 
maker. Neither science nor theology can prove or account for 
their assertion, however. For argument's sake, there is no ob- 
jection to be made to theology's declaration. The definition does, 
however, only explain appearances of the Great Mother, not 
herself. 

Some scientists also work the dualistic method. It is indeed 
a strange phenomenon that Huxley, so great an evolutionist, 
should speak in so strong a theological form as he does in the 
following quotation. However, his words need not be under- 
stood theologically. The finger he speaks about, is indeed di- 
vine; it is the hand of the Great Mother, the plastic force of her 
art. And the whole of the description is indeed a wonderful il- 
lustration upon her workings, and upon the personal character, 
I see everywhere in what is called Nature. 

Nature reveals an activity towards the realization of ideals. 
In his Lay Sermons (pp 260-1) Huxley has given us an illus- 
tration. Said he : "Examine the recently laid tgg of some com- 



THD GREAT MOTHER 23 

mon animal, such as a salamander or a newt. It is a minute 
sphereoid in which the best microscope will reveal nothing but 
a structureless sac inclosing a fluid holding granules in suspen- 
sion. But strange possibilities lie dormant in that semi-fluid 
globule. Let a moderate supply of warmth reach its watery 
cradle, and the plastic matter undergoes changes so rapid, and 
yet so steady and purpose-like in their succession, that one can 
only compare them to those operated by a skilful modeler upon a 
formless lump of clay. As with an invisible trowel the mass 
is divided and subdivided into smaller and smaller portions, 
until it is reduced to an aggregation of granules not too large to 
build withal the finest fabrics of the nascent organism. And 
then it is as if a delicate finger traced out the line to be occupied 
by the spinal column and moulded the contour of the body, 
pinching up the head at one end and the tail at the other, and 
fashioning flank and limb in due salamanderine proportions, in 
so artistic a way, that, after watching the process hour by hour, 
one is almost involuntarily possessed of the notion that some 
more subtle aid to vision than an acromatic would show the hid- 
den artist, with his plan before him, striving with skillful manipu- 
lations to perfect his work." 

Following her dualistic method, theology tells us that Nature 
exists only for ends, purposes and uses. And she delights in 
being useful. Earth, air, fire and water offer themselves to man's 
service and every natural object serves another: see how the 
earth and atmosphere make the lily possible ; how the sun quick- 
ens it ; how rain nourishes it and how chemical agencies energize 
it, etc. Everything in Nature is intermediate, receiving from 
something gone before, giving to something coming after. 
Everything is ready to subordinate itself to something else. All 
this is perfectly correct. That which we are told describes the 
Great Mother's method of work, but not herself. And I am 
truly grateful that theology will grant so much. Without know- 
ing it, it admits a personal character, an intelligence, a purposeful 
endeavor, just the very ideas the Nature-Mystic ascribes to 
the Great Mother. 

Theology having conceded the point just explained, is there- 
fore ready to declare that Nature is not antagonistic to spirit. 
On the contrary, it will show us Nature as the manifestation of 
3 



24 the; great mother 

God, as His archetypal thought and sphere of activity. In order 
to prove the existence of God, theology will exalt Nature and en- 
large upon the vastness and the sublimity of a great spiritual 
system of Nature. 

But the foregone will not pass without objections from var- 
ious sides. It will be objected that there is no directing intelli- 
gence in Nature and that she teaches no morals. That she is 
evil. 

The first objection is met fully by the doctrine of immanence, 
which places the Mother as the motive power in the universe. 
Without going into the details of the argument, let a quotation 
from Goethe's conversations with Eckerman suggest all there 
is in the idea of immanence and more, too. "The teachers of 
whom I speak would think they lost their god if they did not 
adore him who gave the ox horns to defend himself with. 
But let them permit me to venerate him who is so great in the 
magnificence of his creation, as after making a thousand-fold 
plants, to comprehend them all in one; and after a thousand-fold 
animals, to make that one who comprehends them all — man. 
Farther, they venerate him who gives the beast his fodder and 
man meat and drink as much as he can enjoy. But I worship 
him who has infused into the world such a power of production 
that, if only a millionth part of it should pass into life, the world 
would swarm with creatures to such a degree that war, pestil- 
ence, fire and water can not prevail against them. This is my 
God." 

As for Nature being defective in morals, let the objectors read 
for instance Arabella B. Buckley's "Moral Teachings of Science" 
and they find themselves contradicted and not only by her state- 
ments. Numerous other arguments have been brought forth 
elsewhere. The objector will learn that life is not a mere selfish 
warfare but mutual help and service and that these are among 
the very laws of existence. It will be seen that when a being 
ceases to be useful and industrious it becomes a burden upon 
others and falls out of existence. It will be shown that injuries 
recoil upon the injurer. 

How wonderful ! that even 

The passions, prejudices, interests 



THE GREAT MOTHER 25 

That sway the meanest being ; the weak touch 

That moves the finest nerve 

And in one human brain 

Causes the faintest thought, becomes a link 

In the grtat chain of nature.* 

As for the charge of being evil, Nature could, if she spoke in 
our language challenge the objector and ask for a definition. 
Whatever the answer would be, it would constantly come back 
to certain fundamental facts of Nature, which can only be 
called imperfection, privation, etc., all distinctions lying in Na- 
ture's general idea of being manifestations as finite and subser- 
vient to her own higher purposes. And even Nature's finiteness 
can easily be shown to work for the ultimate good. Only by be- 
ing in time and space could Nature become the realization of 
the infinite purpose. Again, liability to pain is inseparable from 
being in time and space, hence not necessarily a deficiency in 
Nature. 

Theology is compelled to be moderate in its judgments re- 
garding Nature, because Christianity itself is only a limited and 
imperfect agency. Christianity emphasizes the imperfections of 
man's condition at the same time that it speaks of man as God's 
steward and direct image. 

My son, the road the human being travels 

That on which blessing comes and goes, doth follow 

The river's course, the valley's playful windings, 

Curves round the corn-field and the hill of vines 

Honoring the holy bounds of property; 

And thus secure, though late, leads to its ends.** 

Evil is not conspicuous on the part of Nature but a method 
subservient to the education and development of man and life on 
earth. 

"Pain in man 
Bears the high mission of the flail and fan." 

The sooner we recognize it the better, because 



* Shelley: Queen Mab II. 104. 
** Schiller : Piccolomini. 



26 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Who never ate his bread in sorrow, 
Who never spent the darkness hours 
Weeping and watching for the morrow 
He knows you not, ye high powers.* 

Behind the Veil 

I have in another part treated the mystical side of Nature and 
emphasized the value of phenomena. But the Great Mother has 
also been felt to be "behind the veil," an "invisible reality." 
Saints and sages alike have proclaimed that things are unreal and 
hiding the Real. 

Let us hear the testimonies about "the things below" and "the 
things above," they too, witness about the Great Mother. Saints 
and sages alike rest their definition of Nature by saying Nature 
is the sum total of that which is observable by sense, or, in other 
words Nature is the Ever Changeable around us, that which is 
in a constant state of "coming to be" but never is. And Christian 
saints further characterize this "Becoming" as "this" world in 
contradistinction to what they call the supernatural. Their 
terminology moves between appearances and realities. 

Beginning with the Greeks, I will review some of the more 
prominent systems dealing with this subject. 

Parmenides observed that sensations of the same object dif- 
fered according to the senses of different persons, nay of the 
same person at different times. Hence he concluded that all 
notions derived from sense are but seeming and that only the 
ideas of Reason can give us confidence and perfect reality. The 
sense perceptions are relative; the conceptions of Reason are 
absolute. Anaxagoras established these distinctions. 

In our own day, psychology says that the senses perceive only 
phenomena, never noumena. Tyndall expressed this in his 
Belfast Address: "When I say, I see you and I have not the 
least doubt about it, the reply is, that what I am really con- 
scious of is only an affection of my own retina. And if I urge 
that I can check my sight of you by touching you, the retort 
would be that I am equally by this second assertion transgressing 
the limits of fact ; for what I am really conscious of is that the 



* Goethe : Wilhelm Meister. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 27 

nerves of my hand have undergone a change. All we hear and 
see, and touch and taste, and smell, are, it would be urged, mere 
variations of our own condition. That anything answering to 
our impressions exists outside of ourselves is not a fact, but an 
inference." , 

So far so good. But Mystics declare that their "facts" are 
as real as the facts of science and the "inference" which Tyndall 
will allow them is quite sufficient evidence. But more than that. 
The very "change" of the Professor's hand proves that a reality 
is in and back of his hand. 

Huxley (Lay Sermons 373) meant to assail all mystic knowl- 
edge when he said "Matter and force are mere names for cer- 
tain forms of consciousness. What we call the material world 
is known to us only under the forms of the ideal world," but he 
did the very opposite. He has furnished arms against materialism. 
There is no matter as trees and mountains; there are however 
trees and mountains as forms of life: they are matter only as 
long as they are the phenomenal thing which we see, taste or feel. 
In themselves they are life. 

With this clearly before our minds, it is easy to see how far 
the stated theory is helpful or not to realize the Great Mother's 
Presence. If nothing were, nothing could appear. Visible exis- 
tences imply essences out of which they come to view. And such 
essences can not be products of our minds, because the forms to 
which they give rise are not in our power. 

Let us not take the phrase "behind the veil" too literally. Let 
us remove for the time being all mechanical conceptions and all 
materialism and try to realize the following quotations on En- 
pantitheism or the Divine Mother as cause and life. By so doing 
the phrase "behind the veil" may be very useful for a realization 
of her. 

In the Memorabilia Xenophon records Socrates as saying 
"There is a divinity so great and glorious that it at once sees 
everything, hears everything, is present in everything, and takes 
care of everything." And Xenophon declares it is "all eye, all 
ear, all intelligence and without the labor of thinking, moves all 
things by the force of this intelligence." Aristotle termed this 
divinity "the prime mover" and the Stoics named it "the working 



28 THE GREAT MOTHER 

force" in the universe or "the spirit which pervades the whole of 
things," diffusing everywhere "generative thoughts." Antoninus 
addressed this divinity in personal terms and said: "All things 
come from Thee, exist in Thee, return to Thee." 

No matter whether the Mother is the Veil herself, or behind 
or in front of it, we feel her Presence everywhere. We are like 
God and God is like us. If the Human is denned in terms of the 
Divine, the Divine must be denned in terms of the Human. Said 
Schiller (Phil, letters) "The Universe is a thought of the Deity. 
I find only a single manifestation in Nature — that of Mind, the 
thinking essence. All within me and without me is only a hier- 
oglyph of a Power which resembles me. Harmony, truth, order, 
beauty, excellence, give me joy because they raise in me the ac- 
tive state of their designer; because they reveal to me the pres- 
ence of a rational Being, and leave me to define my affinity with 
this Being. A new experience, e. g. of gravitation, etc., gives me 
a new reflection of a Spirit — a new acquaintance with a Being 
like myself. I read the soul of the artist in the 'Apollo.' " 

Intellectually we may correctly say that the Great Mother is 
unknowable in herself, but from experience we may also say 
that She is knowable by the Veil. Not all veils hide. Some veils 
reveal. Said Socrates (Mem. iv. 3, 6) "Just as the sun does not 
permit itself to be curiously pried into, punishing with blindness 
the presumptuous gazer — so the Supreme withdraws from all 
created gaze — seen indeed to do the grandest things, but not to 
be seen." 

I sum up all the numerous quotations, I could furnish, but 
have no room for, thus: The Great Mother is absolute Spirit 
and also self consciousness in me; she is Thought prior to all 
other thoughts; she is the primal energy but also force in me. 
Marcus Antoninus' words (xii, 28) are apropos: "You ask where 
I have seen this wondrous god and how do I know of that god's 
existence, and my answer is : 'My own soul I have never seen, 
yet I bow in reverence before it. In like manner, every time I 
experience anything of the power of God, I conclude from that 
to God's existence and I bow in reverence.' " 

In conclusion I will quote Fiske's Cosmic Philosophy 
(11. 470) : "Deity is unknowable just in so far as it is not man- 



the; great mother 29 

if est to consciousness through the phenomenal world;" it is 
"knowable, just in so far as it is thus manifested ; unknowable, in 
so far as it is infinite and absolute; knowable, in order of its 
phenomenal manifestations; knowable, in a symbolic way, as 
the Power which ^is disclosed in every throb of the mighty 
rhythmic life of the universe ; knowledge as the eternal source of a 
moral law which is implicated with each action of our lives, and 
in obedience to which lies our only guaranty of the happiness 
which is incorruptible — They who seek to know more than this, 
are in Goethe's profound language, as wise as little children who, 
when they have looked into a mirror, turn it round to see what 
is behind it." 
This kind of reasoning leads to the idea, that 

Nature is a System of Nuptials 

Nature arises as a result of a dual influence which pervades 
it throughout. That influence is an infinite paternal and maternal 
principle, a bisexual principle. Religions and philosophies of 
the past have taught this. Christianity knows a little of this 
wonderful conception, but only a few of its sects and votaries 
have lived practically in it. It came into Christianity by way of 
Judaism and Judaism got it from Chaldea and Egypt. The books 
of Moses are quite clear on the subject and Christ was the ful- 
filment of this natural order. 

Various names have been settled upon as terms expressive of 
the law; but the names are more or less indefinite, and uncer- 
tain because we know comparatively little about the Oriental 
mysteries in this respect. In India, the masculine has been called 
Varuna by some scholars, and the Feminine Aditi, and, the Word 
or their union has been called Mitra. Other scholars have used 
other names, but they all agree that the bisexual principle was 
well known. In Egypt, the masculine was Amun-Ra and the 
Feminine Neith ; and the Solar God or the Word was Osiris. In 
the Kabbalah we hear of the Ensoph, the Sophia and the Logos. 
Among the Gnostics, the Abraxas, Sophia and Christos (or 
Gnosis). In Babylonia, Bel, Melissa and Tammuz. 

The Meaning of the Eternally Feminine 
I understand the Eternally-Feminine to be a romantic ex- 



30 THE GREAT MOTHER 

pression for the religious term the "Great Mother" and that 
again as a translation into Humanity of the older thought: Na- 
ture. 

I use the three terms interchangeably and apply them to 
woman. 

The term "Eternally-Feminine" comes as all know from 
Goethe's "Faust." If it did not originate with him, it came 
into vogue with him. 

The term occurs in the last song of the tragedy, and is sung by 
the Mystical Chorus as follows : — 

All things transitory 

But as symbols are sent: 

Earth's insufficiency 

Here grows to event: 
The Indescribable 
Here is done: 

The Eternally-Feminine 

Leads us upward and on ! 

Goethe's phrase is the Eternally-Feminine; he is not merely 
speaking about Femininity or the woman in Femininity of time 
and space. 

His thoughts reach far beyond mere actuality. He is 
seeing a vision in that phrase "the Eternally-Feminine" ; he sees 
the Deity as Mother, as woman. He is himself drawn beyond 
the phenomenal world, "earth's insufficiency," and into the In- 
describable. 

The first two lines are simply descriptive: 

All things transitory 

But as symbols are sent. 

Most idealists and symbolists will probably understand that 
and heartily agree. Nevertheless, though all things are only 
transitory and symbols — nevertheless on this earth the indescrib- 
able becomes an event, an act. That is the meaning of the next 
two lines 

Earth's insufficiency 

Here grows to event. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 31 

The Mystics are all familiar with this fact. Dionysius, the 
Areopagite, expressed it by saying "We do not know God, nor 
can we know God, but we can nevertheless keep communion with 
God." How does this happen? How is this possible? How does 
the Indescribable become an act? By 

The Eternally-Feminine, 
(which) leads us upward and on! 

Goethe is not mystical. He is very plain, but sets forth what 
has become somewhat mystical on account of popular ignorance. 
He is teaching a fact, not indulging in fancy, when he states 
that the Eternally-Feminine leads us upward and on and is that 
potent factor which represents the Indescribable to us under the 
form of an act. He tells the same thing as the Areopagite, that 
though we may not know the Divine, we may nevertheless be in 
communion with the Divine through an act of life. To repeat, 
the general meaning is that all things are transitory and symboli- 
cal, and that earthly things get a real value by the symbol, and, 
that by the symbol the Indescribable is manifested. And the 
moving factor behind the transitory, the earthly and the Indes- 
cribable is the Eternally-Feminine, the Woman-Soul, which thus 
is set, as the connection between the heavenly and the earthly 
spheres. The Eternally-Feminine is the connection between the 
heavenly and the earthly spheres. By means of the Eternally- 
Feminine earth can be and is lifted out of the earthly spheres. 
That is Goethe's teaching. 

What is the Eternally-Feminine? Goeth e's, phrase is imper- 
sonal, but it stands for the Personal. It means the Divine con- 
sidered as Woman or Mother, not as a or the Woman, as a or 
the Mother, but as Woman, Mother, without the article: Nature 
at large. 

It is an old conception that the Divine is Mother. The most 
primitive religions have it. j£ is not a ... dedication or a person- 
ification of woman or sex. The process of thought was the other 
way: woman is personal because the Divine is person; woman is 
divine in proportion to the degree in which she manifests the 
Eternally-Feminine. 



32 THE GREAT MOTHER 

If we do not keep these definitions clearly before us we land 
in absurdities. 

The Eternally-Feminine as defined by Goethe I read in a 
short paper of his on Nature, overlooked by most people. 

The short paper I refer to is entitled "Die Natur." It was 
translated in full in "The Open Court," for July 5, 1894 by H P 2 
as follows: 

"NATURE! We are by her surrounded and encompassed — 
unable to step out of her and unable to enter deeper into her. 
Unsolicited and unwarned, she receives us into the circuit of 
her dance, and hurries along with us, till we are exhausted and 
drop out of her arms. She creates ever new forms; what now 
is never was before; what was, comes not again — all is new, 
and yet always old. We live in her midst, and are strangers to 
her. She speaks with us incessantly, and betrays not her mystery 
to us. We affect her constantly, and yet have no power over 
her. She seems to have contrived everything for individuality, 
but cares nothing for individuals. She builds ever and destroys 
ever, and her workshop is inaccessible. She lives in children 
alone ; and the Mother, where is she ? She is the only artist : from 
the simplest subject to the greatest contrasts; without apparent 
effort to the greatest perfection, to the precisest exactness — 
always covered with something gentle. Every one of her works 
has a being of its own, every one of her phenomena has the 
most isolated idea, and yet they all make one. She acts a play on 
the stage: whether she sees it herself we know not, and yet she 
plays it for us who stand in the corner. There is an eternal 
living, becoming and moving in her, and yet she proceeds not 
farther. She transforms herself forever, and there is no moment 
of standing still in her. Of remaining in a spot she does not 
think, and she attaches her curse upon standing still. She is 
firm; her step is measured, her exceptions rare, her laws unal- 
terable. She has thought, and is constantly meditating; not as man, 
but as Nature. She has an all-embracing mind of her own, and 
no one can penetrate it. Men are all in her, and she is in all. 
With all she carries on a friendly game, and rejoices the more 
they win from her. She plays it with man so secretly, that she 
plays it to the end ere they know it. The most unnatural is also 



the; great mother 33 

Nature; even the stupidest Philistinism hath something of her 
genius. Who sees her not everywhere, sees her nowhere aright. 
She loves herself, and clings ever, with eyes and hearts without 
number to herself. She has divided herself in pieces in order 
to enjoy herself. Jiver she lets new enjoyers grow, insatiable 
to impart herself. She delights in illusion. Whoever destroys 
this in himself or others, him she punishes as the strictest tyrant. 
Whoever trustfully follows her, him she presses like a child to 
her heart. Her children are without number. To no one is she 

inn — ' ^"""" ' illinium n, pnufi 

altogether niggardly, but she has favorites upon whom she 
squanders much, and to whom she sacrifices much. To greatness 
she has pledged her protection. She flings forth her creatures 
out of nothing, and tells them not whence they come, nor whither 
they are going. Let them only run ; she knows the way. She has 
few springs, but those are never worn out, always active, al- 
ways manifold. Her play is ever new, because she ever creates 
new spectators. Life is her finest invention, and death is her 
artifice to get more life. She veils man in darkness, and spurs 
him continually to the light. She makes him dependent on the 
earth, dull and heavy, and keeps rousing him afresh. She gives 
wants, because she loves motion. The wonder is that she ac- 
complishes all this motion with so little. Every want is a bene- 
fit; quickly satisfied, quickly growing again. If she gives 
one more, it is a new source of pleasure; but she soon comes 
into equilibrium. She sets out every moment for the longest 
race, and is every moment at the goal. She is vanity itself, but 
not for us, to whom she has made herself of the greatest weight. 
She lets every child tinker upon her, every fool pass judgment 
on her, thousands stumble over her and see nothing; and she has 
her joy in all, and she finds in all her account. Man obeys her 
laws, even when he strives against them; he works with her 
even when he would work against her. She makes of all she 
gives a blessing, for she first makes it indispensable. She lags, 
that we may long for her ; she hastens, that we may not grow 
weary of her. She has no speech or language; but she creates 
tongues and hearts through which she speaks and feels. Her 
crown is love. Only through it can one come near her. 
She creates gaps between all beings, and is always ready to en- 
gulf all. She has isolated all, to draw all together. By a few 



34 THE GREAT MOTHER 

draughts from the cup of love she makes up for a life full of 
trouble. She is all. She rewards herself and punishes herself, 
delights and torments herself. She is rude and gentle, lovely 
and terrible, powerless and almighty. All is always now in her. 
Past and future knows her not. The present is her eternity. 
She is kindly. I praise her with all her works. She is wise and 
quiet. One can tear no explanation from her, extort from her 
no gift, which she gives not of her own free will. She is cun- 
ning, but for a good end, and it is best not to observe her cunning. 
She is whole, and yet ever uncompleted. As she plies it, she 
can always ply it. To every one she appears in a form of her 
own. She hides herself in a thousand names and terms, and is 
always the same. She has placed me here, she will lead me away. 
I trust myself to her. She may manage it with me. She will not 
hate her work. It is not I who spake of her. No, both the true 
as well as the false, she has spoken it all. All the guilt is hers, 
all the merit hers." 

Goethe did not and could not say the Eternally-Masculine 
draws us, because the Masculine does not draw. The supreme 
masculine quality is to be formative, mental and organizing. It 
deals with facts as these are represented by phenomena and de- 
fined by logic. The supreme feminine quality is its vitality, its 
sensibility, its emotion and subjectivity. Femininity rests in it- 
self like the supreme energy. Masculinity is ever moving and 
restless and seeking its rest. The Feminine draws it there. 
Goethe's philosophy is correct and the key to woman is this, that 
the Eternally-Feminine in her draws the Masculine. And 
through the Masculine she draws all that which the Masculine 
stands for, viz. all phenomenal existence, its laws and powers. 

"The Eternally-Feminine draws us." This word "draws" is 
of special importance. The purport of the sentence is to assert, 
that it is the personal element that draws. And so it is. Im- 
personality can not draw ; it never did. It chills ; it starves. No 
scientific fact can compensate for a personal smile, a friendly 
handshake or a love expression. And where is that personal 
element, which has that power? In woman, rather than in man. 
Why in woman? Because she as her personal characteristics 
seeks the Human, the Personal, while man (the Masculine) seeks 



THE GREAT MOTHER 35 

things. He wishes to own, to possess the tangible. The real 
woman seeks the essential, the romantic, the Indescribable, which 
as the Mystic Chorus sang becomes real by means of her. 

Nature and the Eternally-Feminine are synonymous terms to 
Goethe. What he says about the one applies equally to the other. 
Both create ever new forms; what now is, was never before; 
what was, comes not again — all is new and yet always the old. 
We are surrounded and encompassed by both — unable to step 
out of Nature and unable to enter deeper into her. We live in 
her midst, and yet are strangers to her. She speaks with us in- 
cessantly but betrays not her mystery to us. There is an eternal 
living, becoming and moving in her, and yet she proceeds not 
farther. She lets every child tinker upon her; every fool pass 
judgment upon her. Every woman who has ever realized her- 
self as a representative and expression of the Eternally-Feminine 
knows how true this last sentence is even in her individual case. 

Again. Goethe further defines Nature by saying, "She delights 
in illusion. Whoever trustfully follows her, him she presses like 
a child to her breast." The correlative to this in the Eternally- 
Feminine is the darkness in which she envelopes man and yet 
ever spurring him on to the light. The clever individual woman 
dOes the same. She creates wants in order to have them satis- 
fied. 

Let individual man boast as much as he pleases. "Man obeys 
Nature's laws, even when he strives against them ; he works with 
Nature, even when he would work against her." It is the same 
in his relationship to the Eternally-Feminine. It draws him into 
the dance of life and hurries him along till exhausted he drops 
out of her arms. It is the same with his relationship to the in- 
dividual woman. 

The Eternally-Feminine is everywhere and who does not see 
it everywhere, sees nowhere aright. But this is the increasing 
wonder how that she draws us upward and on ! And why is it 
that individual woman has no value unless she represents this 
Eternal Nature? Why is it that individual man is drawn to her 
in virtue of that power, when he in most cases can not define 
it and tell us what it is that draws him and why he is lead into 
a fate unknown to him? 



36 THE GREAT MOTHER 

In individual woman, the Eternally-Feminine is an organic 
harp and its notes tremble into thought in the man. The indi- 
vidual woman holds sway over man because she is not what she 
seems ; she is in the last analysis not a separate soul, but a gen- 
eral soul : the Eternally-Feminine. And why has the Eternally- 
Feminine such a power that it draws and all resistance is im- 
possible ? Because it is the Presence-chamber of the Everlasting 
Mind: it is the dynamic manifestation of the Ideal: it is the 
realization of ourselves : the conjunction of the Ego and the Non- 
Ego. 

By the term "The Eternally-Feminine" I mean the Mother- 
Principle, and the Mould of all things; the rhythm of time and 
the genius, active and passive, which is the God-Power. 

And now about woman. I make a distinction between woman 
as a phenomenon and the feminine principle; a distinction which 
must be made. If it had been made long ago much confusion of 
language would have been avoided and the present day Woman 
Question would be much clearer and simpler than it is now. 

As I said the subject of my writing shall be a presentation of 
views on woman's qualities as bearer of the feminine principle. 
Note this, it is as bearer of the feminine principle that she 
becomes so eminent, as I shall make her. It is not the phenome- 
nal woman I shall speak of in particular, although the phenome- 
nal woman very largely does present that eminence. The phe- 
nomenal woman I have in mind is of course not the commonplace 
creature who for various reasons never has guessed what possi- 
bilities she holds within herself. I speak of women in actual 
life — not mere ideals — women right here in this community and 
our daily life, of married and unmarried, women of leisure and 
women of work, professional women, etc., etc., but mainly of 
women of the Occident; and among Occidental women, I refer 
to those of culture and civilization, those of the so called higher 
classes, those who at present stand in the front ranks as leaders 
in the Woman Questions. Unless these distinctions are kept 
in mind and the limitations of mine are observed, much of that 
which I am going to say will be ridiculed by men and the true 
facts proving woman's superiority will be lost sight of and I can 
not hope to have helped to elucidate any point in the Woman 
Question. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 37 

In the degree with which the individual woman realizes that 
"Each woman is Eve throughout the ages" she becomes a reali- 
zation of that immortal form and power called the Eternally- 
Feminine and not otherwise. It is in virtue of that magic that 
the individual woman is fair to at least one person. It is that 
element in her that can cause a man to grow, to expand. Walt 
Whitman declared "Unfolded only out of the illimitable poem of 
woman can come the poems of man." And another sang of the 
Woman- Wine he needed before his lips could swell with the fire 
of interpretation. 

The Eternally-Feminine is not all sweetness, softness, etc., 
etc. The roses have thorns, the lilies are fragile, honey is apt to 
clog. But the Eternally-Feminine is not anarchic. The wife 
wants to say when it is dinner time. She does not want him to 
eat at all times, simply because he sees the delightful fruit. The 
individual woman may interpret the will of the Eternally-Fem- 
inine in sunbright words, with a smile and a tear, but also in 
sounds heard across the street. The Eternally-Feminine has 
power to transmute masculine dust into solid form and make 
him realize once more that 

"the visible fair form of a woman is hereditary queen 
of us all." 

Men look down upon a woman who is masculine. Women 
look down upon a man who is feminine. And that is correct 
and a proof of soundness of character. Let each be as they are 
by Nature. It is woman's glory to be feminine and man's tri r 
umph to be masculine, each within their own limitation. But 
this interesting question may be raised: which of the two is 
most able to develop into the Universal ? Does the Feminine or 
the Masculine hold most possibilities? I propose to answer the 
question by saying that the Feminine holds the most possibilities. 
And I can prove my assertion by pointing to the fact, that in our 
own day it is woman, who in virtue of her femininity, leads in 
all the spiritual progressive movements. Look around. Every- 
where Theosophy, New-Thought, Christian Science, Mysticism, 
etc., etc., and all the originators and leaders were and are 
women. Look around again. Everywhere municipal house- 
cleaning, purification of politics, universal suffrage, etc., etc., 



38 the; great mother 

and all the originators and leaders are women. For short, the 
idealistic wave that has come over this country and which Europe 
is now welcoming is fed by feminine blood. But it is not merely 
the idealistic trend of to-day, I wish to call attention to as being 
feminine and owing its existence to woman. Nor is it the mu- 
nicipal and political housecleaning that glorifies woman of to- 
day. These two, important as they are, are nevertheless more 
or less external and indirectly related to life. They are not 
personal enough. But in the Personal the modern woman is also 
a leader as woman never before could do it. Women have tried 
it before, but could not overcome the brutality they met. I 
mean that in the personal life of to-day woman is a leader and 
the one who has taken up the question of sex purity. And th e 
sex question lies at the root of all other questions ; it is the very 
question of life and death, no matter how you examine it. In- 
volution ends in sex. Evolution begins in sex. Sex is Life's 
Libra, Balance. I shall not enter upon any details, but this is 
what I have gathered, and I have excellent authority to back 
me up, that woman of to-day has seen the modern danger to 
society and wants to stem the tide of degeneracy by demanding 
that all realize the mental element in sex. The modern woman 
has realized it in herself and demands that man realize that sex 
is more of a mental passion than a physical expression. The 
Great Mother has taught her that. She knows that if sex life 
is not transfigured and cast in a mental mould, it will degrade 
Her and him. And this is the meaning and purport of all the 
present day sex agitation. Everybody who has the welfare of 
the family and the state at heart ought to welcome the agita- 
tion. 

It is the Mind, viz., Will and Wisdom, or the Great Mother 
in us who seeks company and union and beauty. The flesh can 
not do that. The flesh has no such power of its own. The 
mind is so constituted, and such is its law, that it can not stand 
alone, but must mingle with another; neither can the Mind work 
alone, but must needs co-operate; for short, the Mind is always 
seeking a relationship. But the Will and Wisdom of the Mind 
is not towards the physical and is proved by the fact that it finds 
itself bound and in prison, and alienated from itself when it 
has descended into the physical. It feels that it has lowered 



THE GREAT MOTHER 39 

itself if it went there for self -gratification, for joy or for spirit- 
ual satisfaction. The Mind, according to its inherent law, goes 
into the physical only for its own purposes, not for purposes of 
the physical ; and when it does that, it does not suffer. 

Men's difficulty iin the way of the realization that sex 
is really mental passion and not physical expression lies in 
the unfortunate character of all modern education: it is piece 
by piece and technical. People learn about trees, animals, 
money, mathematics, etc., etc., but never, either in school or in 
the church, anything about themselves essentially. Ignorance 
on that point keeps men on the lowest possible plain: the phys- 
ical. 

For woman to gain her point, she must begin by educating 
her brother and her husband in soul life and she can do it, 
because she has the Eternally-Feminine in her, or, which is the 
same, the Eternal Woman behind her. The Eternally-Feminine 
is her intellect and her will. From that source she can draw any 
and all the power she needs. Let her study this subject! 

The fact that sex is more of a mental passion than a physical 
expression is nothing new. As a fact it is co-eternal with human 
nature, but it has been forgotten and its present day proclama- 
tion makes it almost a new gospel. The fact of the mentality of 
sex it intimately connected with the subject; the Eternally-Femi- 
nine. 

Masculinity seeks Life, the life-principle. Femininity seeks 
Form, the plastic principle. Masculinity desires to plunge into 
the Ocean and the Ocean is not deep enough. Femininity aspires 
to be taken into the arms of the great moulding, shaping God 
who is the creator. Woman is personal. The man is impersonal 
and physical. 

The Eternally-Feminine,* The Central Will 

In an age like ours when so much is done to reach the natural 
facts of existence, it seems desirable that we should re-study the 
question of the relationship of the feminine and masculine prin- 
ciples. I do not mean any question relating to man and woman 
as we know them biologically, socially etc. Much has already 
been done and much is being done in those directions, and I 

* Comp. my article in The Woman's WBUlul, Washington, D. C. 1886. 
4 ih"i.0usl*.4. 



40 THE GREAT MOTHER 

shall make use of those studies in the following chapters. I mean 
to go deeper than the mere facts, standing, as they do, only too 
often isolated. (I) I will try to generalize on a large scale. I 
propose to show not only that all reasoning and all facts point 
to the Feminine as the primary and fundamental basis of exis- 
tence, but also that that term represents the Monism we are 
looking for. (II) I shall, however, not be satisfied with mere 
generalizations, I shall test the doctrine ethically. Life is the test 
and verification of all theory. (Ill) The ultimate outcome of 
these chapters will be an address to woman to leave her passive 
conditions and enter the via affirmativa. 

My philosophy is as follows and is a last analysis of facts and 
forms of existence. (I) We realize something which we call 
a base, a root; something which seems to be the Protean basis 
of all forms. I will not name it. "The name which can be 
named is not the Eternal Name." (II) Some think too real- 
istically of this something and describe it only in terms of space ; 
but others are forced into another conception of it; they see it 
only in relationship to itself or to its own parts. The dynamic 
characteristic of these two views is motion. Motion therefore is 
the second category. (Ill) The conception time, or relationship, 
quickly reveals the original something as endless in riches and 
evolution. Riches therefore is a third characteristic; or, to 
express it more philosophically, the third category is form. (IV) 
These riches and evolution suggest an internal harmony, a final 
Monism, an End or Purpose, originally hidden in the primary 
Cause. Harmony is the fourth form or category. With this 
conception closes the logical train of thought. These four forms 
are the abyssal roots of existence or the Mothers to whom 
Mephistopheles advised Faust to go for the key to life. But 
they are only forms or manifestations of the Something. The 
Something itself remains unknown. We do not see it in its 
esoteric reality, we see only its movement or evolutions into the 
four forms of manifestation. This movement or Central Will 
is therefore to us the ultimate reality. Philosophers call the four . 
the natura naturata, the accomplished result; and the movement 
they call the natura naturans, the creator, the producer of the 
four. It is also called the Becoming, viz: "The coming to be"; 



THE GREAT MOTHER 41 

and in daily language we call it Nature. Whatever we call it, 
we mean that it is the Feminine Principle and instinctively look 
upon it as self-procreative. 

The Real we do not know in any other form than that of the 
Feminine or Central Will. We take for granted that there is 
a Substance or Subject. This Substance or Subject we say is 
in a state of inertia, rest or Being. In physics they teach that 
Energy — the same as that I have just called the Feminine or 
Central Will— is never found except in association with matter.* 
So here the Feminine or the eternally gestating Movement is 
never isolated from the Something, Subject or Substance. The 
two are one. While this preserves its identity, the Feminine is 
its manifestation in the four-fold forms of transformation. As 
in physics Energy is the only thing known, so in reality the Fem- 
inine is the only life known or definable. Hence the Feminine 
or Central Will is by necessity the center principle of all phil- 
osophy and is the Monism we all search for. 

But it is not abstract reasonings alone that give this astonish- 
ing result. We see it everywhere in our surroundings. We 
are all familiar with the four stages in the life of the 
Psyche, the butterfly: (I) egg, (II) grub; (III) chrys- 
alis; (IV) butterfly. All four are mysteries, to be sure, 
but there is one all absorbing mystery in or behind 
the four: the movement, namely "the coming to be," its Fem- 
ininity or Central Will. That mystery is truly the mystery be- 
cause the four are only stages of evolution and nothing in them- 
selves if taken apart. "Nature hath neither shell nor kernel; 
she is both at once." What we see is the dynamic movement of 
Being. We can study it, live in it and adapt ourselves to its rules. 
It furnishes us with bases of knowledge, for ethics, for religion 
and beauty, the whole circle of mind life. The same Femininity 
or Central Will is seen in the plant seed, its growth, its fruit and 
the nourishment it furnishes for man and beast. It is truly 
Divinity in the forms of life, light, love and self-sacrifice. We 
can know no other Divinity; Life is so constituted. Whatever 



* Matter means mater, the mother, viz. the abyss whence and out of which all sub- 
stance flows. Substance is identical with mater. Hence physics teaches the same 
doctrine as I am demonstrating philosophically. 



42 THE GREAT MOTHER 

there be, if anything, outside of life, we do not know it. At best 
we guess at it. We do not know it. 

When we turn from the Ideal and True to our concrete world 
we find it ignorant of its own best purposes and ideas. And 
when it becomes "this world" it is even antagonistic and fiendish. 
Moral diseases disturb the vital functions and dishonesty has 
taken away from the living representative of the Feminine, 
Woman, all such influences and honors which she were entitled 
to in virtue of her position as ambassador in "this world." She 
is a stranger in her own house and a handmaid to her own child- 
ren : the men. It was, however, not always so, nor does common 
nature as we know it in daily life favor such social and moral 
actions; but ultimately it will triumph over "this world." 

The earliest social organization was founded on Mother Right, 
(Mutter Recht) substantially as shown by Lewis Morgan. Early 
society, under the primitive institution of the gens or plans, 
was established on the basis that each man or woman traced his 
or her origin back to the head of the gens, which was not a man 
and the father, but a woman and the mother. Woman was su- 
preme and her influence the predominating until the close of 
what is called among anthropologists, the middle status of bar- 
barism. During all this time, at the death of a male, married or 
not, his possessions descended to his sister's children; at the 
death of a female, her property went to her sisters and her child- 
ren and the children of the daughters. The children of her sons 
were not included among her heirs. The son's children belonged 
to the gentes of their respective mothers. Children received 
nothing from their fathers, they belonged to the mother and 
looked to her for everything. Even in later times when tribal 
honors were confined to certain families, all descent was traced 
in the female line and the male was absolutely dependent upon 
his female relations for all and any privilege he enjoyed or 
might attain. 

The reason for this peculiar state of things is to be sought in 
the fact that descent from the mother could be traced with cer- 
tainty, while that from a father was uncertain. It is always so 
and necessarily so. The supremacy of Mother Right was lost 
when marriage originated. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 43 

It has been claimed by opponents of woman and those who 
glory in the so called civilization* that this state I just described, 
is the lowest of all and is degredation itself ; that it is a state of 
utter destitution of morals and now happily overcome by laws 
and customs which make the Masculine the superior and the 
chief of social and moral life. The argument against these peo- 
ple is, of course, that they beg the question and assert the truth 
of a condition not proved to be superior, nor one which gives 
equality to all concerned. The ancient and primitive civilization 
condemned by these people is misjudged and ill understood. For 
people who live in present day philosophy and who are under 
the influence of modern tendencies and social forces it is ex- 
ceedingly difficult to understand what the original human con- 
dition, the natural one, was. Modern society, however, must be 
dissolved and the relief from its hopeless condition is to come 
from a return to original forms of life. Not a return to an imi- 
tation of any past historical existence, but to the aboriginal 
human nature. We have come into a false position in relation 
to Nature. We have misconceived Mind and condemned Na- 
ture to slavery as if she were something vile and degraded. Man 
has fixed himself as the centre of creation and proudly proclaims 
himself as master, though every step is taken with some regard 
to its laws. Instinctively he knows that he holds his sovereignty 
in fief at Nature's pleasure, yet he acts as if he were the auto- 
crat. I can, of course, not here go through the whole of man- 
kind's false development and point out how or where the mis- 
takes were made. Space will not suffice for that, and except to 
the "few," the exposition would only be a Cassandra call, at best. 
The "few" will understand me and with me they lament that 
civilization has gone so far astray as it has; that sentiment is 
laughed at and that degenerate, morbid and slimy subjects are 
chosen for conversation, for the drama and art. The "few," 
however, are the chosen ones and the seed for a new age in 
strong contrast to present day artificiality, insincerity and un- 
naturalness. The "few" will bring us back to enthusiasm and the 
Energy of the Original : the Feminine or the Central Will. 



* The readers will understand what I mean by civilization if they will study Edward 
Carpenter's " Civilization ; its Cause and Cure," or if they will listen to some of the mod- 
ern teachers who preach self-communion attainable in silence and solitude. 



44 THE GREAT MOTHER 

I will now show how the ideas of mankind have changed from 
matriarchy to patriarchy, from the Large to the Small, by an il- 
lustration taken from philosophy; and it will show the general 
drift of our mental and moral movement away from Nature or 
the Feminine. It will also show that we must retrace our steps 
if we will save ourselves. 

The most ancient life was lived in the Open and in constant 
communion with the stars, the winds and the streams. Sun and 
moon were father and mother and the earth was the gentle nurse. 
Highlands and mountain tops lifted the mind up and out into the 
free. Deep forests taught the secrets of the silence and the 
ocean enforced the lesson of the ever-changing surface of things. 
Man stood in awe of the sublime, but he knew not fear. Death 
was but a sleep and an absence. Fruitfulness in children and 
cattle was an honor and riches. The thoughts of those days were 
"cosmological," viz. : expressions of the goodness, truth, beauty 
and greatness of existence. They were not reflections but in- 
tuitions. "Being and thought were one and the same." As 
man did not live in cities, so his thoughts were not circumscribed 
or his morals dictated by policy. His conversation was not 
critical or gossipy, much less reportorial of the neighbors doings. 
Images of fancy did not disturb his union with the Divine, and 
sickness, that dreadful child of city life and civilization, did not 
exist, at least not under any of its known forms. The senses did 
not usurp an empire of their own, but all sensation meant a 
direct contact with the Great Mother. The Godhead was the 
moving spring of the universe. Everything was a living force 
and every living or thought force was a real substantial some- 
thing. Sun and stars as well as stones and mechanical forces 
were personalities, and on the other hand all virtues, even silence 
and walking were corporeal things. This was not materialism 
or some other heresy, as most moderns will say. It was a uni- 
versal brotherhood or sisterhood of all things "in the heavens 
above and the earth below." To the ancients fancies and ab- 
stractions were nothings. That which had no objective existence 
was no thing. By objectivity must not be understood vulgar 
materialism; on the contrary this objectivity is the purest ideal- 
ism. As late as Plato we hear, for instance, that matter is denied 



the great mother 45 

because it is so mutable and perishable and partaking of all the 
characteristics of mind. 

To the ancients there were no dualisms in thought, but only 
monistic conceptions. They lived in pure immediateness and did 
not create worlds of» their own by such mediate means as, for in- 
stance, by fancy, as we do. No analysis disturbed them; to 
them there was no reflection upon the "One" or "the Many." 
They did not "learn," but "felt" the things of God, and in- 
stinctively they lived in the likeness of the Great Mother. Im- 
mediateness and immanence are the two terms which character- 
ize man and God in that state. Translating these philosophical 
terms and methods of life into terms of our present discussion, 
I say that ancient life and philosophy was Femininity and as such 
it was in union with the Original, hence both great, good, true 
and beautiful. 

Let me add that the types or symbols by which the ancients 
expressed this philosophy and theology were all of generative 
character ; the cow-symbol was a favorite one and so was Chaos, 
the original source of all things, and so was the World Egg, the 
cradle of the world. In later times, when the Masculine had 
assumed the leadership of things, the Mysteries still preserved 
the old teachings of the Mother-Goddess and the favorite gods 
of humanity, no matter what be the disguise, are to this day 
Ceres and Aphrodite. All of which shows how fundamental 
the Feminine or the Central Will is and how impossible it is to 
get away from it. It also shows how remote our civilization is 
from the Natural and that the remoteness is not a gain, but a 
loss. A true development would have brought out the contents 
of the Natural and not produced something antagonistic. The 
development should have been so, to use Schelling's words, that 
the Divine would have "Opened its eyes in man." Civilization 
as it is known to "this world," rather closes the Divine eyes and 
presents to man his own phantoms. 

I have already said that inertia is not the characteristic of the 
Feminine. Its nature is mutability and endless transformation. 
In other words, the inherent craving for "otherness" transmutes 
the mother into the child, the flower into the fruit and the seed 
into the new organism. No "otherness" in the sense of radical- 



1/ 



46 THE GREAT MOTHER 

ism takes place. It is only the inherent Nature that transmits 
itself; it is bio-genesis. It is a "widening of Nature without go- 
ing beyond it." The child is not the introduction of a new ele- 
ment into the universe. However individualistic the child may 
be, it is after all only an "extension" of the mother. The inner 
cosmic principle of Femininity re-creates itself, and by that 
evolution it starts a "fatal" opposition to itself, viz.: it enters 
upon a long career of self-diremption. The male child, in par- 
ticular, has been "fatal," and has caused "a fall," from which 
there is only salvation by a return to the Original. That return 
will have been accomplished at "the end of the ages," (N. B. 
Not the end of the world!) We are now in the process of this 
self-diremption, but the signs are many that a new consciousness 
is awakening. When it shall have become fully awakened, di- 
remption will be replaced by union and that again by unity. 

Antiquity expressed this process of self-diremption in mytho- 
logical conceptions. Zeus-Jupiter dethrones Cronos-Rhea. Cupid 
disputes the rule of Aphrodite; Horus reigns where Isis used 
to be supreme ; Buddha, the Enlightened, preaches against Maya, 
Illusion, his mother, and the Christ is professed openly where 
Mary is only worth-shipped in secret. In our own day we say 
(and many glory in the fact!) that the old philosophy, the cos- 
mological, ended when the brutal vigor of Descartes Ego gave 
it the coup de grace. At his time self-assertion and reflective 
thinking took the place of immediateness and intuitive feeling. 
A centre (and a false one) was established "outside" the nature 
of things and around that false centre the new civilization has 
been established. This new order of things (which ought to 
have been of Mind, but which is merely fancy) struggles hard 
to hold its own. Being set against the natural order of things it 
buys its freedom only by perpetual watchfulness and it holds its 
domain only by constant warfare. It is pitted against the cos- 
mic order and can only build its house out of subjective materials, 
which of course are only the real in a state of transformation. 
It is therefore only an unreal existence, one of show. The 
strongest form known of this subjectivism is the theological, 
but that, too, is coming to an end. We are beginning to see the 
fallacy of our reasoning. The New Psychology is the eye-open- 
er. It shows that the emotions are the real expressions of life 



the; great mother 47 

and are not to be condemned; that the will is the mother of 
deeds and not to be negatived and placed under obedience to 
another; that the intuitions reach directly to Divinity and are 
not false guides. The New Psychology is thus doing much to 
restore that sweet ^naturalness of ancient days, which I have 
called the Feminine. Let woman, the highest representative of 
the Feminine, study this movement and listen to the Great 
Mother ! 

The whole difficulty of the Woman Question and of mascu- 
line misunderstanding lies in the ignorance of the diremptive pro- 
cess. It is not understood by woman herself that by her own 
inner necessity she must bear a child, that is to say, must give 
expression to herself and must see herself reflected in order to 
awaken to self-realization. It is not seen that this necessary 
diremption is only a process and no more, and most women fail 
to attain the self-consciousness they seek. Their child becomes 
that self-consciousness. Many a woman even glories in it, but u 
most lose themselves in that process. After the child is born let 
them return to themselves and the new life attained will be their 
light. In that light lies their redemption or return to the Original. 

In the misunderstanding or non-understanding of the process 
of diremption lies also the cause for the common masculine mis- 
judgments. Even a man like Amiel is so blinded that he can say 
without comment, "woman never speaks out her whole thought 
and really only knows part of it," and declare her a "sphinx, a 
mystery and contradictory; a monstre incomprehensible . He can 
not see that these very characteristics are those of Nature in 
diremption and that woman in the making can not be otherwise. 
When our preachers and teachers shall have become familiar y 
with the larger life, the life of the open fields, and throbbing 
heart of Nature, then our educational processes will be rational 
and the travailling woman of self-birth shall not be heard any 
more. The Woman Question will be no more. 

In speaking of our diremptive process I have expressed my- 
self in terms of ordinary experience and have done so in order 
to be understood by everybody, even by those who have not yet 
risen beyond the actual sex lines of this question. There is, 
however, a far more universal plane on which this diremptive 



48 the: great mother 

process is to be studied before it can be said to be fully under- 
stood, and it is a plane on which all women, whether actually 
mothers or not, pass through that process to self-realization. 
That plane is the Inner-Life plane. Let me call it Universal 
Consciousness; that term carries us farther back than others. 
It is also less modern and individualistic. 

Every act of consciousness is self-birth or substitution of 
something ourselves for a something not ourselves, and when 
this process has its cause and effect in the Universal, it is Uni- 
versal Consciousness. It is not something from outside that at- 
tains expression in us, nor is it added to us, or transforming us 
by powers of its own. Consistently we can not admit the reality 
of anything outside ourselves. We recognize Something. Not 
ourselves, it is true, but it has no reality to us beyond that which 
we attribute to it. What it is we do not know, but real it is not, 
though some of us in our ignorance may call it real. It is some- 
thing dynamical; it is Thought hiding behind itself; it is an 
organic activity which unfolds from within. In its self-reflection' 
it appears other than it really is and thus creates an illusion for 
those who do not know. They take shadows for realities. 

Consciousness is not the limited perceptions of individuals. It 
is the going out, the self-creative activity of the universe and the 
self-centred soul. The universe both thinks and wills. The self- 
centred soul thinks and wills; a soul not self-centred does not. 
It may, at best, reflect and re-echo a thinking and a willing of a 
larger entity. 

It will readily be seen that consciousness is and must be the 
main characteristic mentally, morally and physically of that 
Movement or Central Will, which I before have called the Fem- 
inine. The Eternally-Feminine is Universal Consciousness or 
|y*the all-permeating Thought, Will or Mind. Individual woman 
' being the symbol or representative of the Eternally-Feminine 
becomes the manifestation of this process. Potentially every 
woman, be she mother or not, bears children and in these chil- 
dren she attains the new life, self -consciousness and self-realiza- 
(tion. The names of these children are our sciences, arts, philo- 
sophies, industries, our homes, manners and morals, and our 
thoughts and deeds in the great, good, true and beautiful; in 



the; great mother 49 

short the whole human life and activity. I am not overlooking the 
elaboration of these ideas given by her male child; of that I 
shall speak at length later; but at present I am emphasizing the 
fact that these come from women, be they mothers, according 
to the flesh, or not., I am not advancing anything new, either. 
Antiquity understood all this. Are not the Fates, the Muses, the 
Graces, as well as those terrible avengers and purifiers, the 
Furies, Nemesis, Themis, Nike, Eris, etc., all women? Say 
what you will ; is there anything more terrible than these women? 
Did any of them bear children in the flesh? No! Do not be 
deceived by antiquated or by biased theological teachings and say 
that these women were only blind Nature forces. How ridicu- 
lous to believe these rulers to be blind and unconscious! If they 
had been or were so, how is it that they rule to this day and their 
detractors have retained them, still presenting them to the people, 
only having changed their dress? 

There is still another aspect of this subject. Neither child- 
bearing nor consciousness depend upon the physical bond. To 
be sure, they do as we are constituted at present, having de- 
scended into spheres of time and space. But potentially and 
originally it can not be shown that the human form needs the 
fleshly shape in order to realize itself. Consciousness is its own 
inner and outer and the child is simply man over again; nothing 
out of or into a new or radically different plane. It is a meta- 
morphosis, strictly speaking. The sum total of the human must 
be as it always was. As we speak of Eternity as the everlasting 
Now, so we may say that man IS. Essentially that must be the 
truth, relatively, we may, however, speak of man as an evolution- 
ary existence. "The Son" was "begotten from eternity", viz: 
man IS and always was and will be. 

Of these three planes of life of childbearing and consciousness 
the first is the physical; the second is the psychic and the third 
is the spiritual. The first reaches lower strata of life than those 
on which man lives ; it does not always produce rational humani- 
ties. The second is the plane of personality and eminently human 
and double in character; it produces both men, angels and de- 
mons, and also their mental and moral surroundings. The third 
is pure spirit. It is without determination, but not a negation, 



50 THE GREAT MOTHER 

as some have said. It is a true and universal plane of life; it is 
spirit, form and contents. It can exist without the other two; 
but they must have some ray of light from it in order to exist. 
Self-realization on the two is conditioned by its influence, but it 
is itself Self-realization. Physical self-realization is only a 
reflex; psychic self-realization is communion of 2 in 1, and some- 
thing high and eminent from the standpoint of this life. Perhaps 
the highest can be reached. Spiritual self-realization baffles in- 
vestigation and is the primordial mystery. 

Now, to sum up, I have shown that the Feminine or Central 
Will is the only Energy known, and as such the only manifesta- 
tion of an unknown reality. I have also shown by an illustration, 
that the Feminine was thus known in antiquity and that the ad- 
vent of the male child brought a disturbance in actual life, cor- 
responding, to the inner necessary process of diremption in the 
Feminine. I have pointed to the means of redemption or at-one- 
ment and thus shown the philosophical solution of the Woman 
Question. Modern biological studies have also shown the Mas- 
culine as secondary. Of this I shall speak later. In the mean- 
time will the reader pause and think about the subject thus far 
presented. It is not only of momentary interest, but it is the real 
basis for a discussion of The Woman Question and is the 
philosophy of the Eternally-Feminine. 

I have thus far been concerned only with the nature of the 
Eternally-Feminine and the process of diremption, the inner 
necessity. By diremption was meant the appearance of con- 
sciousness or a state of an apparent antagonism between the I 
and the NOT-I. Diremption is no real antagonism but only the 
form of Self-birth. In it the Eternally-Feminine evolves to a 
higher (or highest) condition. 

Diremption spoken of under the physical bond means child- 
birth. Understood psychologically it is self -evolution, and meta- 
physically it is the world-mystery: creation. It is therefore the 
same whether we say child-birth, self-evolution or creation. 
The Eternally-Feminine and its representative, the woman, 
comes into self-evolution by bearing a child (be that child in the 
flesh or not), or, which is the same, becomes a reality by it. The 
child is the expression of that evolution but not a substitution. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 5 1 

It substitutes forms to be sure, but not essence. A mother in 
the phenomenal appearance dies and her place is taken by the 
child and that again becomes mother and dies, but the Eternally- 
Feminine never dies nor does the real mother, for she is like the 
Eternal centred anywhere and has her circumference every- 
where. A real or self-conscious mother is distinct but not sep- 
arate from the Eternally-Feminine. She is related to the Eter- 
nally-Feminine in the same way as we are wont to look upon 
Nature : seeing everything distinct but nothing defined into abso- 
lute independent singleness. We must not look upon Nature as 
priority and sequence, or, as the One and the Many, in such a 
way that we introduce our notions of time and space as essen- 
tials and fundamentals. They are no more than relatives. Na- 
ture is an everlasting continuity and generation is no more than 
self -evolution. 

A real or selfconscious mother is distinct but not separate K, 
from the Eternally-Feminine. She has attained full personality, 
or, which is the same, a conscious existence. She has saved her 
life byjosing it, which is the mystical way of putting it. 

The emphasis lies upon the child then. What is it? Crea- 
tively or fundamentally it is a perpetuation or continued revela- 
tion of the Eternally-Feminine, a revelation both to the mother 
and to the world. 

Primarily in this process of diremption, self -evolution 
and self-revelation, the question of sex plays no part. 
It has nothing to do with it, viz. : it is not necessary. The 
child product is neither male nor female. The distinction or 
further diremption into a phenomenal sex belongs to another or 
much later, the physical state. And the law can even be verified 
under the physical bond of child-birth. We know that the dis- 
tinguishing sex in the foetus comes in long after the child has 
begun its existence. It is a sort of after thought, a decoration 
of the building, not essentially necessary. But even allowing the 
phenomenal appearance some weight, why should one decoration 
be of more value than another especially one which has no direct 
relation to the primitive or original motive of the whole process ? 
It seems but rational and just to give the priority to that sex 
which in idea, purpose and form corresponds to the original 



1 




52 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Centre-Will or Mother, the Eternally-Feminine. The woman, be 
she conscious or not of diremption has her prior claim on Life 
and all its forms, simply because she is the type of the Central- 
Will : The Eternally-Feminine. 

This fact will be admitted readily enough and if the Woman- 
Question hinged upon that alone it could easily be settled. Man 
is willing out of gallantry and formal courtesy to admit the great- 
ness, beauty and true position of the sex, but for the individual 
woman, he will not grant the admission. Cosmologically he will 
Y go into poetic ecstacy, but morally and socially he swears by 
* brutal might. India is an illustration in point. It speaks in in- 
flated enthusiasm about the motherhood of God, and teaches a 
doctrine about the earthly mother as looked upon as the living 
deity. It sets forth the teaching that "one mother is greater than 
a thousand fathers." But that teaching is pure metaphysics or 
abstraction, it is not a moral or social doctrine ; it is not realized 
in practical life beyond the sexual truth it contains. It is not a 
doctrine of freedom, of human equality, and of daily reverence 
such as we would preach it. History in general and the history 
of India in particular has proved that that doctrine had no re- 
generating power. Excepting what England has done, India has 
sunk back into that primeval abyss of mud which also swallowed 
up Syria for the same reason! Violation of woman's eternal 
rights and her reduction to sexual slavery ! The same fate over- 
took Rome and it is now passing judgment upon France. 

The real point of the Woman-Question is its moral and social 
aspect. This of course, rests upon the cosmological. The 
logic of the case must therefore be taught first of all. Next it 
must be enforced that woman's present position must be changed 
and made to accord with her inalienable rights vested in priority 
of existence and the universal and intrinsic value thus conferred 
upon her by Nature. That is the ethics of the Woman-Question. 
Why do not women, the representatives of the Eternally-Fem- 
inine, make use of the tendencies of the many movements of our 
day: most of them are in the direction of the Natural, that Cen- 
tral Will which I have called the Eternally-Feminine? Organized 
efforts are wanted to steer those movements and their progres- 
sive teachings into direct work. Let all those who teach that 



THE GREAT MOTHER 53 

Mind is supreme concern themselves with the process of diremp- 
tion and the consciousness that results from it! Let all those 
who heal attend to the terrible wound which drains the best and 
superior forces of mankind. The Wholeness they offer can not 
become a fact until 'mankind is taken out of that disease from 
which it suffers and which is caused by its fall from truth, order 
and natural law! Let those who proclaim the Motherhood of 
God rise above a mere sexual understanding of that doctrine and 
proclaim it individually and socially ! Let them live as they teach 
and prove that their doctrine is Light, Love and Life and that 
to woman it is given "to garden the earth with the roses of 
heaven", and that she is "Nature's most exquisite child"! Let 
those who hold that metaphysics must rule and that the trans- 
cendental must take the place of the sensual, the phenomenal and 
the passing show, let them, I say, cease to talk in abstract terms 
and let them turn the modern influx of the transcendental into 
the one channel that the well-wishers of woman have dug! The 
Combined waters and the momentum of the influx will overturn 
and break the dams erected by falsity, hatred and destitution of 
true honor! Let individual woman arise and ascend the throne 
prepared for her! Let her stand erect in the strength of the / 
am. Then it shall be seen that there is a universal law revealed 
in Goethe's words: 

. ') Das Ewig-Weibliche 
Zieht uns hinan. 

The Christ and the Eternally- Feminine 

The work of the Christ is to bring the Eternally-Feminine 
within reach of every human being. Jesus is the preacher of the 
Eternally-Feminine. 

Who is the Christ? He is Humanity. 

"The Christ of Humanity is no dream, no intellectual chimera ; 
no theological hypothesis. He is a fact, to which everything we 
possess and are bears witness. History is His autobiography; 
literature is His effort to utter Himself; painting and sculpture 
attest His feeling of beauty; philosophy and science are the 
blooming of His reason; the stages of civilization are the deep 



54 THE GREAT MOTHER 

foot-tracks He has left on the surface of the planet ; the great re- 
ligions demonstrate the scope, quality, and fervor of His soul: 
society — that vast, continuous spreading organization, that 
mighty web of interests, institutions, codes, habits, and practices 
— proves how real, permanent, and persistent His energy has 
been. This Christ is at once visible and invisible: visible in ac- 
tual form of living men, invisible in the shadowy recesses of an- 
tiquity, which once throbbed with life as intensely as our present 
day does. He can be thought of as in heaven and at the same time 
as on earth. On earth you can see and touch Him ; we are part 
of Him ourselves; — in heaven, for there in their serenity, are 
assembled the innumerable company who rest from their labors. 
The Christ of Christendom is a great assembly of powers, per- 
sonified in a single man. The Christ of Humanity is a single 
power distributed among a multitude of men."* 

The Christ being no individual, but humanity, explains why 
he did not marry like other men. Being humanity he had his 
counterpart within himself and did not need to seek to find him- 
self by means of another person. He was an at-one-ment. 

That which he was, we are or ought to be. We are fallen 
apart, but are essentially one. But there are Mystics of to-day 
who live like Jesus without marrying in order to find themselves. 
They live a life of self realization, a life of self communion and 
out of that realization they are able to help others. 

Man, Woman and the Eternally-Feminine 

Woman is the soul of man. Man without his soul 
( — woman — ) is but a mere animal and uses his animal methods 
to subjugate woman to his animal instincts. He succeeds, be- 
cause through her mother-instinct and love of offspring and fi- 
delity to "God's command to replenish the earth," she has given 
in to him. But, now is her time ! She will no longer allow him 
to prolong his sensual sleep. "Of inner laws which women must 
know for themselves, there are these: however deep within the 
Nature that point may be at which occurs an interchange of love, 
that is, life — between the closest boyind of souls, fraternally, 
conjugially, or otherwise, in the case of the woman there remains 



* O. B. Frothingham : Religion of Humanity. 



the great mother 55 

beyond, a depth into which man can never penetrate. — In that 
'within' she is eternally alone with God. 

"Whatever she knows within that depth is forever to man a 
mystery, save for what God, for ends of service, instructs her 
to set forth; but it can never be known to man except through 
woman. In the deep and inward man-woman union of pure 
essences, she touches God herself: through whatever atomic 
chain of beings this union is affected, man touches God through 
her. 

"Hence arises a most solemn science, in which she must be 
educated now by the wisdom of the angelic womanhood — for 
without her understanding it, men can not be saved. The inner 
life-currents of God pass out through the woman's form radiat- 
ing from her centre, to which no other life-currents can have 
access but the Divine One. She is properly and only a radiating 
orb, and her life is passed immediately into the enveloping outer 
form of herself, — her Sympneuma; and then mediately, by count- 
less methods of distribution, into the universe at large. 

"Let woman, with spirit consecrated to the Holy One who 
first designs to love or visit her, seek for her World-Service that 
it may no longer be hourly violated, as it is now, by every method 
and custom of the man-womanhood of the race."* 

The Feminine Principle is Double 

With the Hebrews both the masculine and the feminine prin- 
ciple were double. The Goddess of the Earth was double, both 
fruitful and non-fruitful ; a goddess both of life and death. 
Freyja was both life giving and the receiver of those going to 
Death, like her dark anti-sister, Hela. 

The manifoldness of the Great Mother is also represented in 
the Balder myth. Three women or three forms of existence 
need him for completion: Frigga, Hela and the giantess Thock. 
Frigga wants to preserve the beautiful soul ; Hela to remove him 
from life and Thock to destroy him. And such is Nature. 

In the Hero tales the unfruitful Brunhilde and the fruitful 
Chrimhilde both need Sigfrid. Semele and Hera struggle about 
Backus ; Alkmene and Hera about Heracles. Aphrodite and Per- 



* Dictated by Mrs. Oliphant. See "Oliphant Scientific Religion" page 337-8. 
5 



56 THE GREAT MOTHER 

sephone both want Adonis and Kybele and Agdistis strive about 
Attis. Numerous other mythological illustrations can be shown. 
They all illustrate the double nature of the feminine principle. 

The Hebrews, the Torah and the Feminine 

With the Hebrews we can not expect to find such bright and 
lofty goddesses of the Eternally-Feminine as with the Greeks 
and Teutons, because their Mosaicism did not allow any femin- 
ine principles near Jahveh. Nevertheless, their human nature 
was too strong; it broke away from the Jahveh limitations and 
in later days returned to Femininity in the Godhead. 

In Aserah (Axieros and the Athnara in the Cabiri mysteries) 
they worshipped the fruitfulness of the earth. Images were ded- 
icated to her. Recently a nude clay figure of her has been found 
among Moabite ruins. On its half moon formed diadem stands 
el 'ummat (,'L 'MT) which Schlottman translates as "goddess of 
union." Trees were also dedicated to her. At Bambyke and 
Joppa she was honored as Atergatis or Derketo and represented 
as a woman with a fishtail. Derketo or fissura was planted with 
trees; hence arose forest mysteries and their practices and the 
rites connected therewith seem to have been familiar to the 
patriarchs and their times. Abraham planted such a forest 
(Gen. 21 ; 33) and worshipped God in it. The word Aserah in 
its root as-ar is pronoachic. In Greek it is Isor-a a laconic by- 
word for Artemis. 

The mission of the Jews was the promulgation of the Law. 
The Law is not (and was not) a mere codex of regulations. The 
Torah was a living body to the Jews ; it was the Word or verbal 
covering of the Presence of the Divine-Feminine, The Shechinah, 
the Great Mother. The Law is a form of the mystery of wom- 
anhood and woman shall not be the savior of man till she 
embodies the Law as the most perfect form of the Eternally- 
Feminine or the Divine-Feminine. The Law is Spirit and the 
same which is called Pneuma in the New Testament. The word 
Pneuma, falsely translated "Spirit," "Ghost," "Holy Ghost" sig- 
nifies either Divine Feminine Principle, or, sometimes those be- 
ings who emanate from it, or, the infusion of the power of the 
Divine Principle into created beings, in all cases the Great 
Mother. 



the; great mother 57 

That influx or the afflatus which is infused into Mankind's 
consciousness in our day is the Divine-Feminine, the Eternally- 
Feminine. It seeks women as its natural bearers and forms of 
revelation, and individual women have responded nobly, but 
womankind has not.* It is, however, necessary that all woman- 
kind should respond. 

Is the Eternally-Feminine Manifest ? Is A Science of Woman Possible ? 

In order to answer this question : Is a science of woman pos- 
sible? it is necessary first of all to define science and what the 
scientific method is. 

A scientific statement of woman, her nature, etc., involves (i) 
first of all a systematic statement of ascertained facts, facts 
which would cover or attempt to give an adequate expression of 
her nature, etc., (2) Such a systematic statement must be a 
complete generalization and its goal the discovery of a principle 
that shall connect all phenomena of woman and her life. 

The question then is : is such a generalization possible ? Can 
such a principle be pointed out, a principle that can connect all 
phenomena of woman and her life? Is it possible? I answer 
yes! 

I will show how all feminine phenomena find an adequate ex- 
pression in a certain principle. And my argument is this, that 
if I can show how woman has lived and passed through history 
from the remotest days until to-day and always lived through the 
most varied — and let me say the most cruel experiences — and 
come out as she is to-day, unconquered and really the master , 
of man (in spite of appearances) then there must be a principle 
which has been the power to sustain her. And that principle must 
express her character or in other words be the formula for a 
scientific statement of woman. 

To show that principle, I am compelled to roll up the curtain 
that now covers horrible scenes of the past; it is necessary 
that I reawaken the cries of despair, which filled the air of old, 
and most unwillingly I do it. I shall not indulge in many an- 
thropological details. It would be unnecessary. Any one of 
you can easily enough find the facts that prove my generaliza- 
tions. 

I will divide history into three great sections: Antiquity, the 



58 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Christian Era, the Middle Ages, and our own day, without fixing 
dates for any of these periods. The question then is: how was 
woman in antiquity and what principle characterized her in 
those days, which is still a characteristic mark to-day? Some 
illustrations will show it. 

There is a uniform tendency, singular as it is unscientific, to 
speak in unqualified terms about primitive man. The writers, 
be they anthropologists or mere scribblers, all speak of primitive 
man as an animal, a beast in the semblance of man, but without 
even the necessary fundamentals, which they themselves presup- 
pose necessary to constitute what we call Man. That method and 
procedure is false, of course. It rests upon a very defective 
psychology. 

I shall proceed on the idea that woman has always been wom- 
an, and not merely a being in the semblance of man. But for 
argument's sake, I will even begin where the anthropologists 
begin. For argument's sake, I will take for granted that her 
culture was animal — absurd as it is. 

The animals to which she is compared are, of course, the so- 
called higher animals. But I will go even lower. The fishes and 
almost all insects are usually characterized as utterly indifferent 
to the fate of their seed and a great deal is made out of the 
fact that they never know or can know their offspring. It is 
argued that here is an emphatic proof that Nature cares only for 
the species and not for the individual. Supposing even, for ar- 
gument's sake, that primitive woman satisfied her sexual instinct 
without regard to the future possible offspring, the comparison 
to the low forms of nature is wrong if a theory against her is 
made out of the fact of lust, for the reason that the fishes and the 
insects all seek the proper places for a depository for theirjeggs. 
That fact proves the motherly instinct, however imperfect it may 
be. The motherly instinct is thus not only desire or lust, but also 
Aspiration. And in the case of the woman, the aspiration has a 
conscious character which is evident from the agreement among 
all anthropologists and psychologists of sex. They all agree that 
primitive woman ( — or woman according to her essential charac- 
ter — ) seeks for her mate the strongest, boldest, handsomest 
and best man. For her to do that corresponds to the animal's 
blind instinct for the best place on which to deposit the eggs. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 59 

By this argument I have found the connecting principle; the 
principle on which a science of woman can be built. That prin- 
ciple I will name Aspiration. Woman means Aspiration! And 
what is Aspiration ? Aspiration is a name for the law which ir- 
resistibly lifts us. 

j _ J ^— ....-,.... .."-.m. i 

~~~THe"cnangeableness of woman so often referred to as fickle- 
ness and unreliability is man's misunderstanding of the working 
of the law of Aspiration, which works so irresistibly in woman. 
Her restlessness is another expression of the same law. Her 
inconstancy is also another expression of the same law. 

Back of her changeableness, her restlessness, her inconstancy, 
lies Aspiration, her ideal tendency, and it is the very vascilation 
that moves the world. Vascilation is an ugly word. Rhythm is bet- 
ter. Let me therefore say, let men learn to understand that wom- 
an's changeableness has a method in it ; that her restlessness is vi- 
bration and that too has a law in it ; that her inconstancy is an 
ever forward procession and that in all there is rhythm. Aspira- 
tion or the ideal tendency means a perpetual, irresistible expan- 
sion. 

To-day some woman is so charmed with a friend that she 
thinks the ultimate has been found. But to-morrow the charm 
has lost some of its power and the day after to-morrow it is all 
gone. All this looks bad to an observing but narrow minded in- 
tellect. But a truer psychology sees expansion in it. It is ex- 
pansion that creates the change. 

It is to woman's glory that she responds so readily to the law 
of expansion. If she did not, darkness, sterility and death would 
come soon. 

We must live onward, if we wish to live and come into our 
integral place in the universe. Woman is the natural leader on 
that Path. And the Eternally-Feminine within her causes her 
to love onward. It is woman's Aspiration or ideal tendency that 
causes her to withdraw from the man, who is not able to cut 
new paths for her or too weak and selfish to lead her to all 
that which is most worthy of her. When she first met him, he 
was her hero and seemed to be the realization of her dreams, 
but soon, too soon for her, he proved too limited and without the 
perpetual fire she wants to warm herself with, and which she 



V 



60 THE GREAT MOTHER 

has a right to ask for, because she is Mother Nature's daughter 
and has the Great Mother's fire nature in the heart. 

It is not always a fault, though it is always an uncertainty, to 
marry an expectation. When a woman does it, it is her Aspira- 
tion, her ideal tendency, that leads her to do it. And it is the 
same inclination that leads her to forsake him and wander on, 
either alone or to other loves. The woman who is true to her 
Aspiration or ideal tendency remains independent of her husband, 
neither leaning on him, nor borrowing from him. By so doing 
she lays the surest foundations for the future of both, and he, 
if he is a true man, will never cease admiring her. A certain 
independence and remoteness on her part is the strongest guard 
against degeneracy of the marital relationship and of both 
individually. The woman who says "let him go, if I cease to 
be all to him," speaks from her ideal tendency and Aspiration 
and not in licentiousness. It will be best both for him and for 
her, and for the children if there be any, because in the final 
analysis, he can not love downward, as he says, and she can not 
be untrue to her Aspirations and ideal tendency as she says. 

Aspiration seems to be so fundamental in woman's character, 
that not even fear of death can destroy it. I know of a woman 
condemned to be hung, and who, being allowed the customary 
grace to ask a last favor, requested that she might go to the gal- 
lows under a parasol, the pleasure of which she never had had. 
The request was granted and proudly she walked to her death 
and to the last she was true to her Aspiration and ideal tendency. 

Where culture, however superficial, has reached the sex, we 
find Aspirations very prominent. In fact culture is inconceivable 
without Aspirations. Wherever we find a woman without As- 
pirations, we find there merely a wombman and not a woman. 
Culture and Aspirations make the distinctions between a woman 
and a wombman. Even the scullion is ambitious and has Aspira- 
tions ; the cook takes pride in best cooking. Even narrow minded 
and cold blooded, but truth loving Kant felt himself obliged to 
admit woman's Aspirations and her powers. 

Aspirations are not desires. Desires are of the flesh. Aspi- 
rations are of the soul, the whole man. A. le Braz said: "The 
World is large, but the dream is larger; heaven is large, but 
aspirations are still larger." 



the; great mother 6i 

Individual woman is not respected much for her own sake in 
India. If she were, the Brahman would not hold her in sexual 
slavery. But woman in her Aspirations, woman as the Eternal- 
ly-Feminine is the hidden mystery of the Hindu soul. 

In Persia she was "the strong woman." In the Avesta the 
angel of the law is a woman. Souls are feminine Fravashi or 
Aspirations. The ideal of purity is a girl and the chaste spouse. 
Egypt was an immense image of Isis, the Eternally- Feminine. 
Antiquity figured Life as a woman, because like Life she is ir- 
resistible in her Aspirations. 

"Life may molt many feathers, yet delight 
To soar and circle in a heaven of joy." 

Who can annihilate- Aspirations ? They may be deadened, but 
can not be destroyed. Customs may mock at laws. A woman 
full of romantic Aspirations is like an Arab woman, "the wild 
Arabian mare of Pharaoh, more terrible than an army in array 
of battle." By law a woman may be declared "incompetent," but 
by Aspirations Tullia, Volumnia, Cornelia, Agrippina were queens 
as ever a woman was a queen. 

If anthropologists force the theory that woman was common 
property in most ancient days, then there is no way of explaining 
the rise of the home and the family. That theory must therefore 
be abandoned. Psychologically it would be a better theory to say 
that the family idea was first, simply because it would rise in the 
order of Nature and the mother's instinct, call that instinct de- 
sire or Aspiration, or do what is better still, say that the family 
arose on the call of desires and the mother's Aspirations perpetu- 
ated it. It would be good psychology to say so, because woman 
certainly means the family, its main stay, its glory, and moral 
value. It is so to-day and there is no theory which can do away 
with the other one that woman was woman always. However 
varying and variable she may have been, woman has always been 
woman. This is a truth, so simple that it is often forgotten for 
more fanciful notions. 

It is well known that ancient religions were intensely sexual. 
I need not recite any details. It is also well known how con- 
spicuous a part woman played in those religions. They all had 



62 THE GREAT MOTHER 

goddesses, numerous in number and variety. These goddesses 
were literally present among men in the shape of women. Relig- 
ion was an actual affair, not a dogma. And what did woman 
represent? She always represented the great bearing power of 
life, fruitfulness, or, in other words, the power of uplift, of con- 
tinuity, of centrality, of rejuvenescence, for short, she was an 
emblem of life: Aspiration! 

What is life but desire, Aspiration, ascents ? Do you not per- 
ceive the feminine character? Life means want, need, inclina- 
tion, leaning, longings. Do you not see the woman? Life means 
passion, magnetic attraction, yearning. Do you recognize the 
woman ? All these characteristics of life were also the character- 
istics of numerous ancient gods and they are thoroughly femi- 
nine. They are so comprehensive that a science of woman can 
be built on them. 

In Eden there was no love. Adam and Eve were mated be- 
fore they were married, if ever they were married. In such 
poverty begins the sacred history and its tale about woman. And 
the records from other religious centres are no more encouraging. 
Woman's history in the hands of man is primarily a history of 
his domination and not a history of love. Nevertheless, the ob- 
servant eye of the psychologist can read the history of an un- 
broken spirit behind all tyranny and abuse and the Mystics can 
trace a life of Aspiration and uplift even in degradations. 

It is worth while to follow the inner history of woman and it 
is necessary that it should be done in order to show what the fem- 
inine principle is and that woman is more consistent with her- 
self and her life-idea, than generally admitted. Finally it is 
worth while to analyze woman's soul that we in our day may set 
her in her right place and do her justice. For these reasons es- 
pecially I will run through a few pages of the history of antiquity, 
the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and tell you what I have 
read. 

Ancient art attempted to embody Aspiration and succeeded to 
some extent. It was of course Egypt that did it ; Egypt the land 
of occult studies and penetration into Nature's mysteries. That 
art has been called the Sphinx. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 63 

The Sphinx's body is animal, excepting the breasts which are 
a woman's. Its paws are simian and the wings those of some 
mysterious bird. Its face has all the traits of a sage's counte- 
nance; it is grave and great and serenely looks into the far fu- 
ture. Aspiration is.4n the breasts, that is clear from their shape. 
The face interprets the breasts and also speaks of Aspiration. 
The whole figure is Mystic with beauty. All lines breathe a deep 
procreating and feminine spirit. The mysterious surfaces of the 
giantess spell rejuvenescence and eternal war on death. She 
is bold and ready to challenge time to combat. Who can not 
recognize these traits as the same he has seen in those women 
he has looked up to ? And who has not met with a Sphinx or a 
giantess? Those who have not, have not yet an idea of the 
daemonic in woman, the best element that attracts the real 
man. 

Say the Sphinx is a beast — well ! But what of its "comeliness, 
not of this world?" Say woman is an animal if you dare say 
it to a woman. The expression of sovereignity of the Sphinx 
which you never saw before, you shall then see — and you will 
never again lower yourself. In her expression of sovereignity, 
you shall also see — if you have eyes to see with — that she is a 
temple-soul, built in flesh and blood, to be sure, and liable to 
tremble under sexual and sensual imaginations, but none the less 
a temple from which a soul's Aspirations arise to communion 
with the Highest. 

The word Sphinx is Greek and means the Squeezer or Strang- 
ler; not an inapt name for woman, if her dreadfully passionate 
smile meant only death. But it does not. Woman is the true 
Mystic and therefore meets the suppliant with requests that he 
negate all lust and inordinate affections. And that is meant by 
her inquisitive smile and look. When a satisfactory answer has 
been given, the smile changes to a love-call and her dreadfulness 
becomes an uplift. 

Does not all this mean uplift? Aspiration? It does! "The 
soul in union with God" is not a motto for cowards, neither is a 
real woman a playtoy. To sustain her character, she is willing 
to suffer pain and her history spells agony on every page. Her 
sovereignity has never been crushed; however brutal man has 



64 the; great mother 

been, she has always mastered him, because she knows he is 
brutal and she turns his brutality against him. 

All this which I have just said, I have read in the Sphinx's 
face and on the faces of women of giant character and I am not 
perplexed. Woman is only a riddle to the ignorant and the weak. 
Her very complexity is a solution of her mystery; it is affirma- 
tion, not negation. Woman is the full grown soul ; the man js 
not, I think. He has yet to learn to regenerate his desire-nature 
and substitute Aspirations for desires. Aspirations carry creative 
energy in them. Desires can only impel, but not complete. As- 
piration means perpetual and irresistible expansion, but desires 
kill and give sorrow. 

No matter if we name woman Ashtaroth, Tanit or Aphrodite, 
the fact is evident that the ancient religions had more female 
deities than male. And no matter whether we talk about the 
Kama-dasi of India, of hierodules or bayaderes, this fact is also 
evident, that practically all the occult rites of the ancient relig- 
ions and mysteries were of a feminine character and woman in- 
dispensible for them. And what did woman represent? She 
always represented the joyousness and beauty of Nature — states 
of feeling called bliss — and those 

"Huge and mighty forms, that do not live 
Like living men," 

but appear to the savage as openings into the world of mystery, 
a world the modern man, who calls himself cultured, calls Par- 
adise. In other words, woman even in her degradation means 
Aspiration or is man's medium for his Aspirations or uplift. 
She is always the type of the Eternally-Feminine or the Great 
Mother. 

The Greeks used to say that the sea was terrible; that the 
jj blasts of hot fire were terrible; and the rush of rivers was ter- 
f rible; but none of them so terrible as a terrible woman, and, 
for that reason no painter could adequately represent her, nor 
any language fully describe her. Not a mean view of woman! 
Back of it lies ideas of the Great Mother. Aphrodite, as the 
Greek sculptor knew her, was one type of the Great Mother 
and of woman's Aspirations. To the Greek sculptor, Aphrodite 



the great mother 65 

meant a temple of beauty, not a mere female, beautiful and 
wicked. And Pheidias was right in his austere conception. Prax- 
iteles was right too when he carved softer lines and gave them 
the air of melodies. High aims are Aspirations. Viciousness is 
desire. Plato said Jhat both came from heaven. 

In virtue of being a woman and intended from the beginning 
to have the care of the race in her hands, her brain cells have a 
capacity for complexity, for penetration, for altertness, for deep 
insight, for far reaching designs, for accomplishment by a hun- 
dred means, that man's brain cells have no capacity to follow, 
even afar off. A man's brain weighs and measures more than 
a woman's, but hers is one of spirit, which has neither dimension 
nor density. The head of the Venus of Melos, probably the . 
masterpiece of Praxiteles, is too small, they say, but where is ]/ 
there a man's head like it? 

Another aspect of the Aphrodite-idea may be seen in Helen. 
Helen is like the allegory of beauty; beauty is for all, yet for 
none. So Femininity. She is for all, yet for none. Aspiration 
has no earth-form, but Aspiration is that subtle intensity which 
reveals love and beauty. Helen is also a type of woman. Before 
she matured, even as a child, she was abducted. Theseus violated 
the sanctity of the temple in which she was dancing to abduct 
her and carry her to Attica. Her brothers brought her back, 
but Achilles then took her, but had to cede her to Patroclus who 
again lost her to Menelaus. Paris took her and she followed 
him to Troy. After Paris was killed she wedded Deiphobus ; be- 
trayed him into the hands of Menelaus and with him she finally 
returned to Sparta. And that was the end of her adventures in 
matrimonial life, if I may so call her experiences and Aspira- 
tions. 

Not only is Femininity like beauty for all and yet for none, 
but in Helen, history can show a woman who seemed to be for 
all, yet for none — at any rate while she was young. But I have 
not yet told the whole story about Helen. The legend tells us 
that when Menelaus saw her again he rushed at her with drawn 
sword ready to kill her — but was disarmed by a look from her 
eyes. That is my point. What was that look from her eyes? 
Certainly not one of fear, nor a cry for mercy. Helen was con- 



66 the great mother 



/ 



scious of her power. Her eyes flashed sovereignity, a sovereign- 
ity born of feminine Aspiration. And that conquered as it al- 
ways has conquered. The legend tells still more : Paris in Hades, 
haunted by the memory of Helen's beauty, escaped and that 
Euphorion was the child of their mystic nuptials. See how per- 
sistent the idea haunted the mind of antiquity! The idea dom- 
inated it. It had read woman's character and expressed its un- 
derstanding of her in the tale of Helen. 

The story of Helen may be history or not. It does not matter. 
I am looking into psychology. I see in her ever varying for- 
tunes, the ever changing emotions, and for that reason I look 
upon Helen as a type of Femininity and I claim her as an illus- 
tration upon the principle, which I say makes a science of wom- 
an possible. 

At Mytilene, the girls cultivated the idea of immortality more 
than motherhood. Sappho was born at Mytilene. Plato called 
her the tenth muse. He might just as well have named her As- 
piration for that is the meaning of a muse. The scandalous 
stories circulated about her are unwarranted by facts. 

Who would ever think of representing the muses and the 
graces as men? The nine muses all represent spirituality and 
the immortal life. Mnemosyne was a giantess and goddess of 
memory. Memory to the ancients meant the power to recall all 
the results of past incarnations; the power to present the var- 
ious rounds of experience that lead up to the present moment. 
Mnemosyne is therefore the synthesis of all life-history, both 
cosmic and psychic. 

Look this definition in the face and you shall read woman's 
history as an expression of the Eternally-Feminine element and 
you shall see that face illuminated by an Aspiration that has all 
the world's secret behind it, and in it you shall perceive what an 
ideal tendency is, what Aspiration is. Any fair minded observer 
will, in Mnemosyne, see with me a principle that contains the 
whole science of woman. 

When mythology tells us that the muses "prompted the mem- 
ory" it means to tell us to interpret the Nine as phases of Life 
and Hope, two eminently feminine characteristics, two terms 



the great mother 67 

signifying Alpha or the Beginning and Omega, not the end, but 
purpose and forward reach. And what are these two but what 
I already have called Aspiration and ideal tendency. Look upon 
them singly. Clio is "she that extols" life; Calliope is "she of 
the fair voice" whcf sings the praise of life; Euterpe is "she 
that gladdens" us by life's riches and pure blood; she dances 
hand in hand with Terpsichore, who is like Hope never restless 
but ever joyous and trying to move Polyhymnia, sister Hope who 
is more pensive and always veiled. Thalia and Melpomene go 
hand in hand and in comedy and tragedy they tell us about Erato, 
her of the love-nature and erotic character. All of them pay due 
respect to their celestial sister Urania, who measured man's fate 
by an astronomic measure. 

If anyone should think that my imagination has run away 
with me, let me tell him that that which I have just said is only 
an elaboration of an earlier idea which is not mine. The most 
ancient catalogue of Muses includes only three names : Remem- 
brance, Meditation and Song. What else can the two first be, 
but Life and the last but Hope? 

See how wonderfully Life and Hope can be expressed by 
womanly types. The chemists' atomic table is not more exact 
than the character of the muses. The muses being fundamental 
forces, one is almost tempted to see them as correlatives to the 
chemists'. They are the Great Mother as the Eternally-Feminine 
and every individual woman is related to them in her Aspirations. 

Put yourself under the influence of the spirit that permeated 
the surroundings of Pericles and you find Aspasia to be the 
aspiring genius of the age and the soul of it. Do not look upon 
her as a shameless hetaira. If you do, you do not know what 
an hetaira was or is in the universal economy. She represents 
and is the cup of wine which quickens the blood and the heart. 

There was another also commonly called an hetaira. Her name 
was Phryne. She too possessed elements that could regenerate 
Greeks. She was a delicious creation and most significantly over- 
ruled the Areopagus by her beauty. How could sages condemn 
her for imitating Anadyomene rising out of the sea? When 
they saw her naked beauty they realized that she was truly the 
aspiring spirit of their Aphrodite and that she was shaped such 



68 THE GREAT MOTHER 

as Greek Nature wanted woman to be both in body, soul and 
spirit. 

I have not space to mention more than these two typically 
Greek examples upon Aspiration. The Greek type of woman, 
Aspiration and the Eternally-Feminine, were one of love, of 
subtleness and exuberance. As a type it was so different from 
anything the modern world knows of, that moderns can not even 
imagine its bent and animus. Moderns are afraid to show their 
longings; they will rather crush them in tightlaced convention- 
alities. They do not know what love is or can be, when the 
yearnings of the human heart sigh for the clear air of Arcadian 
mountains or Athenian culture. The moderns restrain all eager- 
ness, dampen their ardor and fear their own magnetism. For 
such reasons the majority can not understand why or how I 
can speak as I have spoken and defined Aspiration as I have de- 
fined and illustrated it. But I stand by my words and deeper 
studies will prove me to be in the right. 

I now come to Rome. 

Numa Pampilius was not the founder, but the first Priest-king 
of Rome; it was he who gave Rome the first laws and her con- 
stitution. His guide was Egeria. Egeria was a nymph and is 
quite famous in Italy's earliest history. That she was a nymph 
means that she was the embodiment of inspiration, the living 
and present matrix or mother of life. Being a nymph or an 
earthform of wisdom or intensity she was naturally Numa's 
instructor. The same Numa also had a visit of a Sibyl, who of- 
fered him nine books containing the future history of Rome. 
But Numa did not consult Egeria this time. In his own wisdom 
he refused the Sibyl's price for the nine. A a result she threw 
three of the books into the fire and asked him the same price for 
the six remaining but Numa again refused with the result that she 
threw three more into the flames, still demanding the same price 
for the three in balance. Numa now paid, and thus demonstrated 
man's shortsightedness and how life compels us to pay the price, 
whether we will or no, at any rate whether we get the sought 
information or not. The Sibyl is the feminine principle, em- 
bodied in woman, which never knows of a more or less — in love. 
Wants it all! Wants her price, even though she finally gives 



THE GREAT MOTHER 69 

only one third of what might have been had in the beginning if 
man's actions had been free, frank and trustful. 

The feminine principle is too simple to bargain. It is really 
not a very remarkable incident that Numa Pompilius should have 
been directed by a nymph, a woman. If we can learn to look upon 
the cosmic economy in the right way, we can also come to see 
that the Feminine, if not prior to, at least is consubstantial and 
co-eternal with the Masculine, and being the most sensitive, it, 
as a consequence, more readily than the Masculine, can see 
into things, hence naturally becomes the guide. And it was so in 
antiquity. The masculine principle even when it officiated as 
priest let itself be guided by Sibyls, Volas and Alrunes. The 
Roman priest and his rites came from the Great Mother in the 
last instance and always through individual woman prophetesses. 
These were instinctively recognized as the proper recipients of 
the Divine Voice, because of their Aspirations. 

The inside character of Rome is revealed by these words of 
Cato Major. "Everywhere else women are ruled by men, but we 
who rule men, are ruled by women." To understand these words 
and the subject of the relation of the Roman husband to the 
Roman wife, a sharp distinction must be made between that 
which was law and that which was practice or custom. The two 
differed radically and to the honor of the otherwise brutal 
Roman man, it must be said that custom and practice resting 
upon natural order prevailed against the man and state made law. 
The Roman acted better than he thought legally. This I give as 
a general statement. I am not ready to press my point. The 
Roman law on marriage is not easily stated. But that does not 
matter. I get my point on woman's superior quality and typical 
representation of Aspiration very easily if my reader realizes that 
from the moment the married woman has responded Ubi tu Cams, ]/ 
Ibi ego Caia to the husband's call when she was lifted over the 
threshold, she was indeed a master as much as he and even more 
so, because the Home in Rome was the centrality for everything 
Roman. 

The Home was dedicated to Vesta (or Hestia) and the special 
devotees of this goddess were the matron and the virgins called 



70 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Vestals. (Of this I have written elsewhere). The Roman ma- 
tron and vestal were another type of Aspiration. 

Rome as a city did not know love. Some think that Rome's 
mystery is revealed by reading Roma backwards as Amor or 
love. But facts do not bear out that poetry. Rome's mystic 
name was Pan symbolized by the god of the Woods or rather 
the Whole, the Universal. Rome was Pan in the sense of the 
word panic : terror. 

Rome spread terror, panic, where she came because her mis- 
sion was to destroy everything effete, everything old and worn 
out and spoiled by wrong use. She also spread terror, panic, 
by her gospel of substitution. She placed herself where she did 
away with that which was useless among the barbarians, whom 
she conquered. Her gospel of substitution was later translated 
into a gospel of vicariousness, but that was not Rome's idea 
when she lived her original life and ideas. She really substituted 
a new life; made the weak function with infused vigor. And 
in all that she revealed the Great Mother's character and woman's 
Aspiration. 

From Rome to the Middle Ages there is a gap in history which 
is not easily filled up in any way, least of all by a record of 
woman except I turn to doubtful ecclesiastical records for which 
I have no space. 

Aspiration or mobility is woman's characteristic and daily ex- 
perience proves that as an essential. Man expects that of the 
woman he loves and reveres and in that lies my proof of having 
found a principle, which explains woman and that proof is 
stronger than any argument possible. 

Man demands of her that she shall create aesthetic feeling, 
sweet sentiments and be incarnated attraction. He expects from 
her to receive such stimulus which can keep him afloat, a buoy- 
ancy, that he shall not sink. And he expects that because he 
himself is hard form, immobility, a staying power, and unsen- 
timental, yet needing the opposite. 

Aspiration or mobility is that power in art which enlivens the 
lines, tinctures the colors, modulates sounds, creates rhythm, for 
short, the life of all art or which is the same, beauty. Beauty is 
the life of art. Because woman is Aspiration or mobility and ex- 



r 



THE GREAT MOTHER 71 



ercises such a power, men have always called woman Beauty. 
We do not speak of a beautiful man. We may call him hand- 
some, dignified, etc., but not properly beautiful. Woman then is 
a synonym for Beauty. The transition from antiquity to the 
Middle Ages and the Renaissance is easy. It is made by means 
of Beauty. 

The Middle Ages cultivated Beauty in several forms. Its 
cathedrals are grand symbols of woman. That is a subject Oc- 
cultists and Symbolists are familiar with, but which can not very 
well be discussed here, at present. 

While the cathedral builders were true worshippers of beauty, 
there was another form of Beauty culture far more universal 
and extended and reaching down to the lowest layers of human 
society. That culture was the adoration of the Virgin Mary and 
the worship offered her. No matter under what form or by 
what ceremony she was hailed as man's ideal of Femininity, her 
rites were essentially beauty-rites and her worship created in the 
public mind the sense of Beauty, uplift of heart and feelings. 

All this is mystic deification of woman under the name of the 
Virgin Mary and is in perfect harmony with the romantic spirit 
of the Middle Ages and its deep emotional religiousness, its as- 
ceticism, its Goethic art and heaven rising church towers. And 
back of it I feel a revival of the essentials of Orientalism. 

This mystic deification of woman and the romantic spirit of 
the Middle Ages are only other forms of the words Aspiration 
or mobility. It was a reaction against classical form and reg- 
ularity. It sought to bring into actual life that intensity and 
dimly felt energy which moves nations and individuals. It cul- 
tivated that passion which always looks beyond present boun- 
daries and sought it as a new and fresh soil for new ideas. And 
the new ideas interpreted the world and man in the spirit of 
freedom and human worth, two ideas hitherto crushed under 
formalism and never fully born into humanity. What simple 
religious enthusiasm did not form or create, was done by Art. 
Art, too, glorified Mary or rather the Eternally-Feminine ex- 
pressed in the doctrine of Mary. The very manifoldness of ex- 
pression found among the religious enthusiasts, I just now men- 
6 



Y 



72 the; great mother 

tioned, proves that Mary is not one woman, but all women, not 
a fact but an idea; and what idea? The idea of Femininity, of 
Womanhood in general. And what are the various conceptions 
of Femininity expressed? They are so many and so varied that 
I must forgo any details. But characteristic expressions any one 
can readily see by looking through a book collection of pictures 
representing Mary in Art. The sum total of the religion of Mary 
and the art types of Mary is the Eternally-Feminine. As early 
as the middle of the second Century the Virgin appears as the 
antitype of Eve. One gives birth to humanity at large ; the other 
is the means of its regeneration. By a curious transposition of 
facts and psychological ideas Mary is both a mother and a virgin 
and it is hard to say which is the most prominent idea; but 
artistically it is of course the Virgin idea that prevails and psy- 
chologically it is hard to see any other justification for the ador- 
ation offered her, than the romantic conception of her as an ideal 
woman and type of virginity. And while that idea is prevalent 
in the early Church, it may well be said that the chivalry con- 
nected with Mary's name arose among the Germanic peoples and 
it rests now on ideas that have been awakened and which seem 
to be indestructible, because they express a central character of 
humanity. 

The veneration of the martyrs led to make Mary the queen 
of the heavenly hosts and from being a lowly recipient of grace 
she became the source and giver of grace. The second Council 
of Nicea, (787 A. D.) declared that the veneration paid to her 
image passed on to her and that he who adored the image adored 
her, the original. That is the climax. No wonder then that Peter 
Damian who was born 1006, could assert that nothing is impos- 
sible to her and said that she restores hope to the despairing. 

Devotion to Mary was promoted by the introduction of the 
recitation of the Angelus three times a day, and, by the Teutonic 
Knights who chose her for their patroness ; the Dominicans who 
aided with the Rosary ; the Fransciscans who advocated most ar- 
dently the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception ; the Carmel- 
ites who boasted of her special favor, etc., etc., 

All this enthusiasm is explainable psychologically; it was the 
enthusiasm of the Eternally-Feminine, and men felt Woman as 



THE GREAT MOTHER 73 

the power of Aspiration. It was so when the man was a Knight 
not a tradesman. How is it now ? 

With the Renaissance it seems woman first becomes woman. 
The sense of reality which awakened everywhere also gave her 
a character she did mot have before. Whatever faults may be 
found with the romantic atmosphere which surrounded her and 
all the false love and misunderstandings connected with the wor- 
ship of beauty represented by woman, the very fact that she was 
a central figure proves that eternal elements must have appeared. 
The Renaissance period did not present us with a finished system 
or inaugurate definite ideas, but it was nevertheless a period of 
power and health, and that was its secret. Its power was re- 
vealed in its human conception of Nature, and thereby it knew 
the Great Mother and woman. Notice I said its human concep- 
tions of Nature and I will add its human conception of human 
life. The statement seems ambiguous, but it is not when looked 
at a little nearer. 

The Middle Ages gave birth to romantic feelings but not to 
the specific human. That age sought the Inner, the Mystic, in a 
most onesided way and never even discovered human worth. 
The common mind was earthly; the superior mind was trans- 
cendental, and there was no connecting mind or transition from 
the one to the other. The Middle Ages were restless for that 
reason; they were dualistic and extreme. The Renaissance 
brought the connection and Man was the connecting link. Na- 
ture was seen in a form of man and Nature was feminine. 

With the worship of the Virgin, the history of woman as As- 
piration naturally comes to an end. The Church has thereby 
placed her before the world as its highest expression of uplift. 

Science will dispose of all the thoughts set forth as mere ani- 
mism and thus deny all mentality and personality. It is therefore 
proper that I should meet the subject. I do it as follows : 

God as Person, Animism and the Great Mother 

"Nature only discloses her whole self to a whole man," be- 
cause, according to the Pythagoreans "like is only understood by 
like." Nature, as Jean Paul said "we can not look at imperson- 
ally, we must needs give her form and soul, in order to grasp and 



V 



74 the; great mother 

describe her." But that does not mean that we must personify 
her and that she has no other personality than that we give her. 
The opposite is the truth. We have personality because Nature 
is Personality and we are created in her image. Jean Paul 
means that only in the degree in which we are confirmed in 
self-realization can we understand Nature. Nature is reflected or 
imaged in us and not vice versa. 

Personality is the root of creation; the measure of all things 
and builds the Temple. 

By personality I understand the Greek Hypostasis and not the 
Roman Persona. The latter means a mask and stands in modern 
language for the human ensemble in psychology. The former 
means substance, man as Soul or a spiritual form of the Eternal. 
I consider Nature as an Hypostasis or Personality and claim that 
the remotest antiquity thought likewise. Only by so doing do 
we get to the real root of religion. 

The subject "God as person" has agitated the thought of man- 
kind from the remotest days and progressively we have gained 
some clearness. Clearness has come in the degree we have dis- 
covered that we ourselves have only a true valuation of ourselves 
if our god is personal. Personality in our God and personality 
in ourselves condition one another. 

What does it mean : "God is Person" ? 

In the first place the sentence does not read "God is a Person." 
It means that Divinity is not a generality or a far off abstraction, 
but an "individuality" having the highest reflective, intellectual, 
moral and spiritual qualities such as man has individuality in a 
narrow and much circumscribed form. But it does not mean that 
Divinity is a human individual or a person like my reader and 
myself nor a fetish like that of the savage. 

I use the words Personality and the Personal for want of bet- 
ter terms, when I want to emphasize the idea of an eternal con- 
sciousness and will behind all things. 

When we learn that Nature is but another name for the Etern- 
ally-Feminine or the Great Mother, then we begin to understand 
what Nature is and that she is neither blind nor mute. When 
that is learned, it is also learned what Personality is and that 
Nature and Personality as terms mean the same. 



the: great mother 75 

If any of my readers have dropped the idea that God is Per- 
son — I advise that they recover the conception. "Universality" is 
not our food. We are still in the flesh and must rise by the flesh. 
Do not undervalue limitations ! 

Most of my readers if they are dualists will be with me if I 
say that Nature is Spirit invisible, personal, they will also follow 
me if I say that invisible Spirit is manifested as Nature. To 
say that Nature is Spirit visible, personal, is better than to talk 
about Animism as the Key to Life and Life's manifestations. 

The conception Animism is a poor substitute for Spirit and 
Personality and utterly inadequate. 

The crudest form of the theory of Animism is that which holds 
that all bodies in Nature are animated by something dwelling in 
them and distinct from them. Another form holds that bodies 
are full of ghosts of departed men. Herbert Spencer has devel- 
oped this theory, the Ghost-theory. A more universal and ra- 
tional view is that which holds that all Nature is animated, but 
it does not make a distinction between the object and its ani- 
mating principle; rather identifies the two. This view is held 
by some anthropologists and in philosophy. 

The anima mundi, the Worldsoul, in philosophy is but a 
thought-form of the Great Mother. It is thought, not life; it is 
an abstraction, not an experience. But the term denoted origin- 
ally that intelligent, moving, directing, organizing and sustaining 
life or Presence which philosophers no more call Mother, because 
they have lost the primitive immediateness. The Great Mother 
is practically an Unknown God to the modern world. 

Among the Greeks, Heraclitus and Anaxagoras still knew of 
the Presence, though they spoke only about Logos and Nous. 
In the Timaus Plato speaks explicitely about Soul as a timeless 
principle, which is the mediation of opposites. The Stoics had a 
fuller conception of the Worldsoul, Pneuma. Many Scholastics 
spoke about the Worldsoul. Abelard changed the customary 
phraseology and spoke of the Holy Spirit where others used the 
word Worldsoul. Maimon and Schelling are especially promi- 
nent, and so is Emerson, as exponents of the Worldsoul, the 
anima mundi. But, though they imply a personal factor, they 
nevertheless talk impersonally. All of these are animists in the 



y6 THE GREAT MOTHER 

sense I used the term above, but their studies and experiences 
rightly valued may become very useful. 

It is not possible here to enter into more details. The works of 
the authors mentioned are easily accessible in libraries and ought 
to be studied by my readers there. Among modern scholars it 
is especially Tylor's work "Primitive Culture" which has given 
currency to the animistic theory. His theory is an ex- 
position of the belief that there is something dwelling in 
bodies but distinct from them ; this something, however, may still 
be material. In other words, Tylor holds that primitive people 
attributed all the characteristics of personality to natural objects 
and points to mythology and comparative religion and philosophy 
for proofs. He holds that primitive people looked upon Nature 
as personal like themselves, variously either physically, force- 
fully, socially, mentally or as moving, opposing, arranging or 
planning. 

Familiarity with Animism and some of the numerous studies 
of the life and psychology of primitive people leads invariably, 
in my opinion, to the Great Mother, as the Reality back of the 
theory. 

Reverting to that which I said above, my reader will agree 
with me that the primitive people no doubt meant that Nature 
was Spirit visible. Under whatever form they lived with Nature, 
they could not avoid the realization and experience of a great 
living personality, greater than themselves. If my reader has 
ever lived in the Open a long time and has been in personal con- 
tact with the Power of the Open, he is in even more than an 
agreement with me. If he has had no experience, let him go into 
the Open and he will understand by and by. 

May that book, Nature, prove helpful! Its subject has been 
so to me. I know what I believe and I stand on a foundation 
that can not be removed. 

Let me end by quoting* that enthusiastic Hindu, Mozoomdar, 
who better than any Occidental can speak about Kinship in 
Nature. 

"A living being is this vast Nature, with the Presence of the 
Spirit for its life, one with me, yet distinct; an august not me 

* P. C Mozoomdar: The Spirit of God: Kinship in Nature. Boston, 1894. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 77 

that puts this unquiet me to rest, — the deep rest of communion, 
— because to its remotest fact Nature has a wonderfully human 
aspect. The farthest sweep of the telescope, the minutest re- 
search of mathematical instruments, discover and realize in 
their operations an intense family likeness between the observ- 
er's mind and the delicate adaptations of which he takes account. 
The soul is continually finding itself, finding the order of its 
own laws, feelings, and reason wherever it finds admission in 
the universe. 

"God in Nature's economy is profoundly human. Might not 
that account for a great deal of primitive worship? In all her 
faults and fulnesses, Nature is strikingly like man. He who 
feels fully at home in Nature; feels in it the satisfaction of his 
deep instincts. Things call out to him as Kinsmen to a Kins- 
man; and in perfecting himself, he perfects all that is around 
him. Commune with the old mystic mother, ask and search, 
penetrate from sanctuary to sanctuary, plunge from depth to 
depth in spiritual absorption, you will find in Nature further 
revelations." 

Let us return to our Mother! 

Poetry and the Great Mother 

From Animism there is but a step to the poetic conceptions 
of Nature. Poetry is essentially an interpretation of what we 
have felt or feel to be beauty. It is "the breath and finer spirit 
of all knowledge" and as "immortal as the heart of man." Its 
substance is always beauty. And beauty like goodness and 
truth, is one of the Great Mother's manifestations. 

The poet is distinguished from another person by being an in- 
tense soul or which is the same full of the Great Mother. The 
Great Mother is intensity. He is therefore naturally the Moth- 
er's living expression. Poetry as art deals with the real in the 
actual. The poet is therefore like an infant in the lap of his 
environment or the workings of the Great Mother. If he be 
true to his inspiration, he can therefore tell us more than phil- 
osophy can even think of. His feelings are truer than metaphys- 
ical abstractions and when he expresses his feelings, he reaches 
our heart rather than our brain. 

Philosophy according to its fundamental idea has always had 



yS THE GREAT MOTHER 

a tendency to regard Nature as a self-subsisting thing. It lives 
by distinctions. But the poet is synthetic; he gathers and looks 
for kinship. Nature is constantly wooing him and he returns the 
love. The philosopher may well sit still in a city and meditate 
and find logic in things. But the poet can not do that. He must 
be in motion and feel motion. To him Nature is never a life- 
less mechanical thing, but a throbbing entity seeking an intimate 
relation with him. The philosopher is inclined to treat imagina- 
tion as vague dreams ; but the poet knows it as an image-making 
faculty not guilty of deceiving him with man-made fancies. 
Imagination may not be reasonable and self-corrective to others, 
but it is so in his own case because he cultivates it and worth- 
ships it as a divine faculty. The poet's imagination is in a 
profound sense pervaded by the universal life. Hence it exhales 
golden streams and it can express the deep tones that lie in the 
silences of Nature; it can figure the Uncreated and bring us 
into the Unseen Presence, the Great Mother. Hence poetry is 
one of Mother Nature's great ministers. 

I have already alluded to imagination as reasonable and self- 
corrective. To repeat the same in another way, I will say that 
it is Reason in us that kindles scientific wonders. By it, the 
poet becomes the Great Mother's priest. Through him we real- 
ize that the universe was made for man and that the soul was 
made for the universe. In other words, that the two are parts 
of one another and when we realize that, we may be sure the 
Great Mother is very near. 

A story* is told of a Westmoreland dalesman who, as he was 
walking with Wordsworth by the side of a brook, suddenly said 
to him with great spirit and a lively smile, "I like to walk where 
I can hear the sound of the beck !" Beck is the Westmoreland 
word for what in England is called a brook and in Scotland a 
burn. "I can not but think," adds the poet, "that this man, with- 
out being conscious of it, has had many devout feelings connect- 
ed with the appearances which presented themselves to him in 
his employment as a shepherd, and that the pleasure of his heart 
was an acceptable offering to the Divine Being !" 

This is Wordsworth's reflection, and Principal Shairp adds: 



* J. C Shairp: Poetic Interpretation of Nature, Edinburg, 1877, page 37. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 79 

"I shall but add that his liking to hear the sound of the beck 
was mere commonplace to him, but passing inward had awak- 
ened and imaginative echo which is the birth of poetry." And 
I will add as a commentary to both writers, that the shepherd 
heard the language of Nature or the Great Mother. Her lan- 
gauge is not dictatic, but full of soul guidances, direction and 
assurance. It establishes eternal relationships. Sometimes it 
clothes itself in forms of bird notes or in the sounds of a beck, 
or in gentle whispers from leaf to leaf, but ordinarily it is im- 
mediate and direct. It is, as I said, the poet who helps to make 
us realize the mutual relationship of soul and the universe. An 
illustration upon this may be found in Wordsworth's "The 
Excursion."* 

To the glory of Wordsworth's boy be it said, that it was not 
his ignorance of the science of light which enabled him to rise 
to a sublime height. He possessed a science indeed; one of the 
heart and one much more certain than those of the senses. He 
had an inner and personal realization of the union of his own 
soul and that of the universe. Neither his unconscious certainty 
nor his realization could be taken away from him. The ordinary 
scientist's certainty is one of sense and memory and can be lost 
because the senses and the memory can fail. The Inner-Life 
never fails. The Eternal Mother is in the Inner-Life as well as in 
the Outer-Life. The two are one to her and to us when in 
ecstasy. 

Truly the Proverbs said (xxix: 18) "Where there is no vision, 
the people perish." How could they live without the Great 
Mother? 

If the Mother can not reach the people by "the starry heav- 
ens above," she tries it by the moral and religious nature within. 
The Law is everywhere the same. All her works are co-ordinate. 
Homer, Aeskylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Dante, Shakespeare, 
Goethe, David, Isaiah, Job, etc., etc., are all religious teachers 
and all speak of the secret things of the Mother and of her 
workmaster, the Redeemer. They all preach the same godly 
fellowship of God's Men and Nature and all establish "a new 
heaven and a new earth." They are all themselves practical real- 



* The most characteristic part is quoted in my lecture on Art. 



V 



80 THE) GREAT MOTHER 

izations of the kinship between religion and poetry. They keep 
us awake to the movement in music and speech and exclude all 
who have no clean hands and pure hearts, no justice and good- 
ness. They not only teach us how to feel the Divine operative 
in human life, but through them the intolerable burden of joy 
utters itself. 

"Oh, Thou (Mother) bounteous giver of all good, 
Thou art of all Thy gifts the crown! 
Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor, 
And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away." 

And finally, if the Mother has no opportunity to reach a 
worthy pupil either by the stars above or by religion within, 
she may find a way by means of art. An illustration from 
Goethe's autobiography will make this clear. 

"While residing in Strassburg," he wrote, "I happened once 
to be in a large party at a country house from which there was 
a beautiful view of the front of the Minster and the tower that 
rises above it. 'Tis a pity/ some one said, 'that the whole is not 
finished and that we have only one tower.' I replied: 'To me 
it seems quite as great a pity that this one tower is not com- 
pleted ; for the four volutes end much too abruptly. Four light 
spires should be added to them, as well as a higher one in 
the middle where the clumsy cross now stands.' As I made this 
declaration with my accustomed earnestness, a lively little man 
addressed me, and said, 'Who told you that?' 'The tower itself,' 
I answered. 'I have observed it so carefully, and have mani- 
fested so much attachment to it, it at last determined to confess 
to me this open mystery.' 'It has not informed you untruly,' 
he responded. 'I have the best of means for knowing, for I 
am the superintendent of the public edifices. In our archives 
we still have the original design, which says precisely the same, 
and which I can show you.' " 

It is evident from this confession that Goethe's imagination 
recognized the law which should regulate the entire construc- 
tion. The primary lines demonstrated of themselves to him what 
was in the original designer's mind and heart. Even in art 






the; great mother 8i 

there is nothing arbitrary; if there is, then the art is imperfect 
and not after the Great Mother's heart. 

When E. A. Poe wrote the following he must have been filled 
with influences directly from the Great Mother. His words 
are the palpitations of a human heart. Their power is not from 
the imagination. They really picture the Presence of the 
Mother. The ambrosia is the Great Mother. 

"We shall reach a distinct conception of what the true poetry 
is, by mere reference to a few of the simple elements which in- 

~ I - I.H. .... M».l — II 1 ..- ... ■ ' ■ II ■ — ■ 

duce in the poet h imself th e true poetical effect. He recognizes 
the ambrosia which nourishes his soul in the bright orbs that 
shine in heaven — in the volutes of the flower — in the clustering 
of low shrubberies — in the waving of the grain-fields — in the 
slanting of the tall Eastern trees — in the blue distance of the 
mountains — in the grouping of the clouds — in the twinkling of 
half hidden brooks — in the gleaming of silver rivers — in the re- 
pose of sequestered lakes — in the star mirroring depths of lonely 
wells. He perceives it in the songs of birds — in the harp of 
Aeolus — in the sighing of the night- wind — in the repining voice 
of the forest — in the surf that complains to the shore — in the 
fresh breath of the woods — in the scent of the violet — in the 
voluptuous perfume of the hyacinth — in the suggestive odor that 
comes to him, at even-tide, from far-distant, undiscovered is- 
lands, over dim oceans, illimitable and unexplored. 

"He owns it in all noble thoughts — in all unworldly motives — 
in all holy impulses — in all chivalrous, generous and self-sacri- 
ficing deeds. He feels it in the beauty of woman — in the grace oP"\ 
her step — in the lustre of her eye — in the melody of her voice — 
in her soft laughter — in her sigh — in the harmony of the rustling I 
of her robes. He deeply feels it in her winning endearments — \ 
in her burning enthusiasms — in her gentle charities — in her 
meek and devotional endurances — but above all — he kneels to / 
it — he worships it in the faith, in the purity, in the strength, in \ 
the altogether divine majesty — of her love." 

All this so objective, so real that it must have come to him 
from the Great Source. Such language and its power 
of suggestion is deeper than any intellectual construction. It 
is enthusiasm (or rather entheasm) or God-Possession. It is a 
description, a painting of the Great Mother. 



82 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Vital Force and the Great Mother 

If it be necessary to find an impersonal term for the Great 
Mother or her activities, none seems better than "vital force," 
even though the "modern world" has declared against it. In 
spite of objections, there certainly is a "vital force" which, as 
far as possible, repairs an injury to an organ and does the re- 
pairing according to an original "schema" and never haphazard. 

Instead of saying with modern scientists that all power is im- 
personal, I use "vital force" as a term for that force which 
builds up all vegetable and animal (human) organisms, because 
that force acts personally by will and thought; it is not a blind 
force; it is conscious and deliberate in its actions. 

The Great Mother is the Power of Life 

Angela of Foligno, the Mystic, identified in experience the 
Holy Spirit with the Indwelling Christ. So did Paul and the 
Gospel of John. With these great souls, I declare the same iden- 
tification and further identify them with the Great Mother. It 
is she who gives us personal religion and without her there is no 
partaking in Life. Without her, Life merely passes over us, 
but we give no sound like a bell struck by a power. If we 
oppose her or her Will as manifested by her Workmaster, we 
are balked and baffled everywhere. The ignorant and vulgar 
feel life vigorously enough, but in the way of a beast. But 
Nature, the Great Mother is Magnus Homo. Pindar, Plato, 
Wordsworth and Emerson knew that. 

Pindar had realized that "one is the race of men and gods, and 
from one Mother we both inherit the breath of life." (Nem. 
6.1). This was Orphicism. In that conception rested the Greek 
idea of a life in harmony with the Whole (Nous). Plato and the 
Stoics defined that life. Marcus Aurelius put it this way: "The 
soul (our daemon) or faculty of reason is the genius, which 
Zeus has bestowed on every man to be a ruler and guide, even a 
fragment of himself." 

The Great Mother's Gift to Her Children 

Love, The Leveller and the Uplifter 
By Grace Gallatin Seton 

To me, Love is all the Great Mother, but the Great Mother is 



the; great mother 83 



not merely all Love ; in addition to all power and wisdom, includ- 
ing Love itself, she is the great undifferentiated Plus. 

We are all her children — men and women, animals and flowers 
alike, up and down the ladder of evolution; fair of brow and 
crooked of back; those from whose eyes glance the power of 
Love; those who look out blankly upon their world — uncompre- 
hending, struggling against the darkness of their own making and 
therefore hating — poor hunted souls, driving back the Love that 
heals and harmonizes. 

Hard indeed is it for the Soul Stuff to impress upon evolving 
man the lessons it learned among the animals, the flowers, the 
little multitudinous leaves, the grasses and the tiny crawling 
things — what you will. The lesson of joy in life and the particu- 
lar form of expression of life is a lesson of love : The lesson of 
patient submission when the forces beyond their strength buffeted 
and punished— when the elements turned from friend to foe. 
This the lesser created thing endures if possible, and accommo- 
dates itself to if possible, if not, resignedly lets go of its par- 
ticular form of expression, willing substance for the angel of the 
Wild Things to mould anew. Some call this death. It is the 
alchemy of the Great Mother — Love — it is ceaseless activity of 
all created life, Her children. 

Can one look at the maple tree yonder and doubt? Certainly 
none who has begun to make friends with trees. Many messages 
are awaiting from them for those who have the hearing ear. The 
Indians founded some of their most beautiful legends on the tree 
spirit. A favorite is that of an Indian Maiden who lost her 
lover on the eve of marriage. She used to go to a particular tree, 
a straight-trunked sturdy oak, and lament and long for her lost 
love. Leaning against the tree she seemed to find comfort as 
she poured out her soul. Presently she began to feel the presence 
of the tree answer her with gentle murmurings of comfort, and 
she wept no more but listened and talked to the tree. All the 
hours she could steal from her duties as daughter of the teepee 
she spent with her tree lover, until one evening, as the after 
glow was fading from the sky, and every created thing seemed 
to hold its breath in the twilight hush, she turned and flung her 
arms around her tree and poured out her love to it. And as she 



1/ 



84 THE GREAT MOTHER 

did so, the trunk seemed to be alive with a human thrill. The 
lower trunks became arms that embraced her, topped by a cap 
with princely plumes. It was the face of her ideal lover, not the 
one who had deserted her, but the ideal which had lain next her 
heart, in all her maidenly longings. By her love had she created 
it — and by love are all things created. 

And so, my friend, the tree opposite my window typifies to me 
the spirit of the Wild Things, the Great Mother's children. 

Being a maple, it is content to be a maple, and glories in its 
multiplicity, it being at that stage of its development. Some 
day its Soul Stuff may be expressed in the simplicity of the great 
single stem of the upstanding pine, with its trunks towering 
laterally aloft. Who knows? But now it has a dual trunk, 
springing a few feet from its base and wide spreading symmet- 
rical branches, dowered with a wealth of perfectly formed leaves 
which provide a greatful shade for those who would tarry be- 
neath. Its bark is smooth and healthy, its roots reach out for 
sustenance, and share it with the grass and ferns; all are har- 
monized. This tree expresses beauty, patience and peace, and it 
is never more peaceful than when a wild wind storm is tossing 
its branches and shivering its leaves in rhythmic delirium. It is 
basically, fundamentally rooted; if the sun beats, it is well; if 
the storm blows, it is well ; if the lightning strikes, it is ready. 
And in the days and days of patient being, in heat and cold, it 
is the same ; and so in the nights and nights of standing upright, 
holding out its multiple self in the darkness, just being what it 
is, a tree, attuned to cosmic harmony, and responding to the 
surge and flow of the life pulse. But in the moon-light it takes 
on a borrowed glamor. Under the red, red moon of harvest it 
shines with added promise: A friendly ear can fairly hear a 
low rhythmic hum, ascending spirally into the brooding air. And 
in the pale white light of a winter's moon, its branches, outlined 
black, speak, again, patience, beauty, peace. "All is well with 
my soul," it expresses. Is it not priceless, this gift of the Great 
Mother ? 



There is a prophecy in the Hermetic Books* to the effect that 



* The Divine Language of Celestial Correspondences, by C Turnbull, page 101-2. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 85 

woman being the last created form must be an improvement on 
man, and in due time her superiority would be demonstrated. 
Here are a few extracts : 

"And now I show you a Mystery and a new thing, which is 
part of the Mystery *of the Fourth Day of Creation. 

"The word which shall come to save the world, shall be uttered 
by a Woman. 

"A Woman shall conceive, and shall bring forth the tidings of 
Salvation. 

"For the reign of Adam is at its last hour; and God shall 
crown all things by the creation of Eve. 

"Hitherto the Man hath been alone, and hath had dominion 
over the earth. 

"But when the Woman shall be created, God shall give unto 
her the kingdom; and she shall be first in rule and highest in 
dignity. 

"Yea, the last shall be first; and the elder shall serve the 
younger. 

"So that Man the Manifestor shall resign his office; and 
Woman the Interpreter shall give light to the world. 

"She is the Eyes which enlighten; the Power which draweth 
inward to God. 

"And her kingdom cometh; the day of the exaltation of 
Woman. 

"For the Woman is the crown of Man, and the final manifes- 
tation of Humanity. 

"But the creation of Woman is not yet complete : but it shall 
be complete in the time which is at hand." 

This is a very difficult doctrine for one whose thought has 
become crystallized by modern materialism, to whom might is 
might, and the under dog is under dog forever. It is however 
the Great Mother speaking. 

Let me illustrate by a simple sketch, how it appears to some, 
this gospel of the Eternally-Feminine. The painting was done in 
ordinary India ink on an ordinary Japanese fan by a Japanese 
artist, presumably ordinary, if a human being is ever that. It 
represented the inevitable snow covered Fuji Yama in the back- 
ground. A stream ran from it to the foreground; over it a 



86 THE GREAT MOTHER 



anc 



bridge; on its banks a single pine tree; both mountains, bridge 
and tree reflected in its tranquil surface of steady, slow moving 
water; that was all: but the impression left on the seeing eye 
represented the epitome of Life and Love. The upstanding 
pine symbolized the Masculine and Dominant. The water, the 
horizontal line, the surface reflecting the pine, the bridge and the 
mountain, represented the Feminine. 

Small wonder, that the pine, knowing itself to be and seeing 
itself reflected by its opposite, conceived itself as the whole, 
quite forgetting that it was even then drawing its very life 
from the moisture of the stream at its roots. Finally the tow- 
ering mountain symbolized the blending of the two, inextricably, 
into an emblem of power, of beauty, of patience and of peace. 
It is Being and Becoming. It is the uprearing, impressive force 
of the Masculine. It is the low lying retentive foundation of the 
Receptive and Feminine. Together, tier on tier, goes the dual 
creation, even as Fuji Yama, coursed over by rushing torrents, 
draped by primeval forests, white-crowned by the child of the 
sun and earth. A poem in the Great Mother's Book of Love. 

But why concern ourselves with the better or worse of the 
case. The world proceeds on its upward spiral and the Her- 
metic prophecy is near its fulfillment mayhap, may not. Just 
listen to the heart beat of the spheres and all things fall into 
their ordained place. Is the lion of more importance in the 
scheme of things than the mouse? Cleopatra than my cook? 
The chances are that the one who presides over pots and pans, 
has learned the lesson of life quite as well as the lady whose 
haughty spirit cast her slaves to death when they brought ill 
tidings. Except for the capacity for loving. There, the Egyp- 
tian queen proved herself a fitter vessel for the cosmic activity. 
Is it not so with all great people? 

Is it, that in such measure as one responds to the call of the 
Mother, — one is great? Varied only by the infinite change of 
media through which the divine afflatus has passed during the 
ages. Has not the greatness been the same — the capacity for 
loving in some form? 

Thus, step by step the Mother, through the magic of the Great 
Leveller and of the Great Uplifter, does She teach her children 



THE GREAT MOTHER 87 

their superlative greatness, their infinite littleness and eternal 
place, in the cosmic symphony! 

Mothering the Race 
B-i£ Eugenie R. Ewscu, M. D. 

I have asked myself the question and reason why the Mother 
is everything to us, and why her love transcends all love and 
affection which the animal and human world knows of. Is it 
because we, from the day of birth, look into her loving and 
endearing eyes and in her embrace feel the whole world? Is 
it because she nurses, protects and teaches us? Is it because she 
loves us when we are good, and suffers when we are bad, yet 
loves us the more? Is it because she rejoices in our aspirations 
and happiness? Or is it because she seeks to right us when we 
go wrong? When we are condemned, despised and forsaken 
by our friends, she is the only one who still believes, shields and 
pities us. Or is the reason more significant and deeper than 
that? Yes — she is the root and substance of our very nature, 
the inseparable essence of life, and we the facsimile of her. 
Her purpose, virtue and function are written everywhere by the 
great universal Mother. 

The universal genetic purpose is distinctly motherly, construc- 
tive and conservative. Each cell seed bespeaks the universal 
Mother idea. 

Science proclaims motherhood in the biologic mother cell; 
chemistry in the mother crystal; philosophy in the primordial 
mother substance; philology in mother tongue; business in 
mother pearl, and religions in mother gods. In Holy Writ, the 
first two chapters of Genesis introduce us to Adam's Man's 
Mother. 

Woman's name is love and reverence from the first to the 
last breath of life, and her influence is felt in the very marrow 
of our being. Is it a wonder that from time immemorial, art, 
science and literature worship at her shrine? Everywhere her 
image, in form, color and sound are set up. In fact through all 
avenues of sense, emotion, mind and spirit we praise her. How 
to reconcile this fact? Only by the knowledge that through 
mothering the progress of cosmic evolution is furthered. Un- 
7 



Y 



I/H 



V 



88 THE GREAT MOTHER 

less we grasp this truth there is no reason or intelligent expla- 
nation of the purpose of evolution and generation. 

The mystery of life is this: that Mother-Nature everywhere 
snatches life from the fangs of death and the gapping grave. 
Can any rational being explain the reason in any other light 
than that Mothering is and must be a universal divine creative 
impulse? The infant born bears the mammary eternal mark 
upon its breast, and the little baby girl plays mother to its 
doll. 

In the Mother as in the child, the future Mother, both past 
and present blend into a radiance of hope, trust and immortality. 
That is why all living beings love the Mother. It is something we 
feel we are. It is the allness or wholeness of her. It is she who 
inspires divinity in us and lifts clay unto gods. Wherever she is, 
we think of God. In the tongue of flame, in the gust of wind, 
in the rushing waters, in the melancholy bleat of the innocent 
lamb as in the smile of a nursing, cooing baby looking into its 
mother's face, her voice is known, her strength appreciated. 
Heaven and earth is her abode and where she goes, her memory 
is linked to eternity. 

Man may foolishly deny the evidence of God ; may frankly say, 
"I know not my father," but of his mother, he can not deny. 
Upon his breast and navel, he bears the double maternal sign 
which he can not deny. It proclaims from whom he issued and 
to whom he is attached. 

All genetic cosmogonies have their central growth and devel- 
opment in the matrix of the Mother, and the Great Divine Mother 
places her seal upon each unit, be it a grain of sand, or a blade 
of grass, to bear the everlasting germ of maternal conceptive 
propagative life into expression. In the human specie, even be- 
fore consciousness, as we know or understand it, as early as the 
fifth month of pregnancy, the child has been heard to seek vocal 
expression with its premonitory cry of A-I-M, a yearning, la- 
menting sound of the unborn soul, meaning Mother in the He- 
brew tongue. 

In the universal language A-I-M is Mother. In fact, it is the 
first sound uttered by babies — A-I-M or E-M-M. Later, through 
human reflection mirrored upon the optic and accoustic conception. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 89 

it spells back as Ma — Mere — Mother — Mutter, etc. This thir- 
teenth letter M is the plane of manifestation in the phenomenal 
world and truly mothers all beings. In primitive language, most 
of our feelings and actions are expressed through that A-I-M. 
In pain or agony, what crying sound awakens more pity, compas- 
sion, sympathy, than A-I-M? In consent, there is the guttural 
exclamation of H-M-M for yes ! Few of us dream of its origin 
and deep significance, yet we could write it all over us and in 
us. Who could endow us with that wonderful strength, en- 
durance, patience, sacrifice of mothering life after life, but A-I-M 
— God — Mother? Could we but grasp our origin, evolution, or 
get the gist and resume of it all, what a new light could be thrown 
upon the value, duty and ideality of Motherhood. 

Those who contemplate becoming mothers should look upon it 
as a divine and sacred function. Marriage should only be con- i^. 
summated under the most favorable and healthy conditions, by 
people fit for same, otherwise the sins of the parents will fall 
upon the offspring. Awaken within yourself the sense of moth- 
ering, and the meaning of a mother's relationship to God, the 
universe and herself, as a physical, mental, moral and spiritual 
being; the important role she plays as an economic, social, civil 
factor; in whose womb are drawn, nurtured and brought forth, 
angels or demons, in accordance with her wish, thought, desire 
and knowledge for good ! ! 

What strange experience the new born, barely arrived upon 
the scene of action, this our world, has to meet! With the first 
breath of physical life, having taken up the cudgels of indepen- 
dent expression in a personal body, immediately the umbilical 
cord with its thirty serpentine coils, the link of attachment to the 
inner mother and the yonder world, is severed. This is the first 
blow. Already, there the knapsack is overladen with the debit 
and credit of prenatal influence and post natal pellmell; already 
the burden of life shows crosses and squares; and already ex- 
perience and adjustment enter into the equation of life, with 
the question, whence, whither, why and wherefore. Already 
upon its horizon are seen clouds sailing along the sunny beams. 
Were it not for Mother's arms which serve the Great Mother's 
purpose, pressing the begotten to her bosom's arcana and from 
the fount of love caressingly sustaining the young with the milk 






! 



90 THE GREAT MOTHER 

of life, where would humanity be? This love faculty is surely 
not of flesh but of the soul, and the soul, being feminine in ex- 
pression, though sexless in essence, is the life vehicle for life. 
Therefore the Woman-Form is a Soul-Mother-Form, and she is 
capable of expressing duality, positive and negative, masculine 
and feminine. As such she is the founder of the family. 
Through Mothering it is possible to have a phenomenal world 
in dual form, though the divine absolute is sexless and change- 
less. 

If we have realized the mistakes of the past, let mothering 
humanity realize that the development, happiness of the race 
state, family and individual, depend upon ideality, nobility, pur- 
ity, strength, health and morals. Intuitionally we knew that 
long ago. In life we neglected it. Let us now turn our face 
to the truth and start anew the march of our soul's unfoldment 
for the better. Thus will the Mother fulfill her mission and 
regeneration. 

A Short Review of Nature Poetry 

Wordsworth 

No one will dispute the title of being Nature's priest when I 
give it to Wordsworth. Other English poets have admired Na- 
ture, but Wordsworth's relation was intimate worship and per- 
sonal : 

"He turned a theology back again into a religion; he revived 
in a higher and purer form those primitive elements of reverence 
for Nature's powers which had diffused themselves into specu- 
lation, or crystallized into mythology; for a system of beliefs 
about Nature, which paganism had allowed to become grotesque 
— of rites which had become unmeaning — he substituted an ad- 
miration for Nature so constant, an understanding of her so 
subtle, a sympathy so profound, that they became a veritable 
worship. Such worship, I repeat, is not what we commonly im- 
ply either by paganism or by pantheism. For in pagan coun- 
tries, though the gods may have originally represented natural 
forces, yet the conception of them soon becomes anthropmorphic, 
and they are reverenced as transcendent men ; and, on the other 
hand, pantheism is generally characterized by an indifference to 



THE GREAT MOTHER 91 

things in the concrete, to Nature in detail; so that the Whole 
or Universe, with which the Stoics (for instance) sought to be 
in harmony, was approached not by contemplating external ob- 
jects, but rather by ignoring them."* 

When Words worttt's views of Nature had fully matured they 
were as follows : Nature is self subsisting and exists outside of 
man's thoughts and feelings and is wholly independent of him. 
Nature is a unity of life and power bound together into a living 
Whole. Wordsworth felt that Nature had a life like his own and 
he communed with it. He came to Nature for calmness and sub- 
limity, to be quieted and refreshed, ennobled and raised to higher 
levels. He saw Nature as an image of right reason, made visible 
in order and stable law. He recognized the eternal unity pervad- 
ing all things: it was to him "the presence and the power of 
greatness" — of the Mother. 

While yet a child, and long before his time, 
He had perceived the Presence. 

At times he called the Presence "an invariable law" and said 
that it is our guide to goodness and sacred peace. How did he 
live? 

The power 
Of Nature, by the gentle agency 
Of natural objects, led me on to feel 
For passions that were not my own, and think 

Of man, the heart of man, and human life 

How exquisitely the individual mind 

to the external world 

Is fitted and how exquisitely too 

The external world is fitted to the mind. 

This is Wordsworth's realization of one feature of the Great 
Mother's Life and the Presence. In no way was Nature a rever- 
beration of his own voice or a reflection of his own moods. Na- 
ture or the Great Mother was to Wordsworth "an active prin- 
ciple", 



* W. H. F. Myers: William Wordsworth, English Men of Letters. Harper & Bros., N.Y. 



92 THE GREAT MOTHER 

In all things, in all natures, in the stars 
Of azure heaven, the unenduring clouds, 
In flower and tree, in every pebbly stone 
That paves the brooks; the stationary rocks, 
The moving waters and the invisible air, 



from link to link 

It circulates, the soul of all the worlds. 

This "active principle" Wordsworth had realized as having Per- 
sonality as much as we have it. It was one life, one will, one 
character, one person, (i) There is joy in Nature: 

It was an April morning : fresh and clear. 

The Rivulet, delighting in its strength, 

Ran with a young man's speed ; and yet the voice 

Of waters which the winter had supplied 

Was softened down into a vernal tone. 

The spirit of enjoyment and desire, 

And hopes and wishes, from all living things 

Went circling, like a multitude of sounds. 

The budding groves seemed eager to urge on 

The steps of June: as if their various hues 

Were only hindrances that stood between 

Them and their object: but, meanwhile, prevailed 

Such an entire contentment in the air 

That every naked ash, and tardy tree 

Yet leafless, showed as if the countenance 

With which it looked on this delightful day 

Were native to the summer. — Up the brook 

I roamed in the confusion of my heart, 

Alive to all things and forgetting all. 

At length I to a sudden turning came 

In this continuous glen, where down a rock 

The Stream, so ardent in its course before, 

Sent forth such sallies of glad sound that all 

Which I then had heard appeared the voice 

Of common pleasure : beast and bird, the lamb, 



the; great mother 93 

The shepherd's dog, the linnet and the thrush 
Vied with this waterfall, and made a song 
Which, while I listened, seemed like the wild growth 
Or like some natural produce of the air, 
That could not cease to be. 

(2) "The second characteristic of the life in Nature is its 
quietude. She has joy, ecstacy in her life, but it is untroubled 
ecstacy. We are 'pressed by heavy laws,' tormented by doubt, 
and rent by struggle against conditions which we will not obey 
at once. Nature's life is at peace, for her children never wage 
a foolish strife with her ; nor does self enter their hearts to make 
them weary of life. Deep calm is at her heart, the mountains 
rest in their own peace, the stars shine quietly, the sun 'sinks down 
in his tranquility'; the flowers keep a still silence, and though 
there are storms which drive the clouds in passionate course, and 
torrents which rend the earth, and strong forces which sweep to 
and fro the elements in bewildering and endless motion, yet in 
the higher region of thought in which these things are seen in 
their relation to the great whole, there is 

'Central peace sustaining at the heart 
Of endless agitation.' 

And this, too — this tranquil being in each thing which sends 'its 
own deep quiet to restore our hearts,' this central peace, was not 
self-born in Nature — it was in Wordsworth's thought the in- 
effable calm of God's existence which spoke to us and redeemed 
us. 

(3) "The third characteristic is ceaseless intercommunion, and 
that was founded on the unutterable love which flowed through 
all things, and with which each thing acted on each other. The 
whole world was linked together. Every part, every element, 
gave and received, honored and did service to each other. 
Each plant and hill, cloud and stream, has its own life and char- 
acter, and they delight in social intercourse like friends who love 
each other — there is no jar, no jealousy, no envy there — their 
best joy is in being kind to one another. 



94 the great mother 

"This idea is the lovliest of all which Wordsworth introduced 
into English poetry, and it flowed from his conception of every- 
thing in Nature having its own peculiar life. I might give a 
hundred instances of it, for it runs like a living stream through 
all the woodland of his poetry. 

"This is the idea of Life in Nature which Wordsworth has 
given to the world. It fills the heart of his readers ; it makes of 
Nature a new thing to them; it makes the commonest walk in 
the woods a delight, a teaching, a society; it fills the world with 
life and energy and joy; it uplifts us sometimes when alone 
among the hills — Nature is in one of her wild moods, and her life 
most intelligent and most eager, into a kindred ecstacy in which 
we long to be borne away with wind and cloud to join the mighty 
stream of rejoicing Life. So was it once at least with Words- 
worth : and with this I close.* 

"Oh! what joy it were, in vigorous health, 
To have a body (this our vital frame 
With shrinking sensibility endued, 
And all the nice regards of flesh and blood) 
And to the elements surrender it 
As if it were a spirit! — How divine, 
The liberty, for frail, for mortal man, 
To roam at large among unpeopled glens 
And mountainous retirements, only trod 
By devious footsteps; regions consecrate 
To oldest time! and, reckless of the storm 
That keeps the raven quiet in her nest, 
Be as a presence or a motion — one 
Among the many there ; and while the mists 
Flying, and rainy vapors, call out shapes 
And phantoms from the crags and solid earth 
As fast as a musician scatters sounds 
Out of an instrument; and while the streams 
(As at a first creation and in haste 
To exercise their untried faculties!) 
Descending from the region of the clouds, 



* Stopford A. Brooke: Theology in the English Poets, London, 1874. 



the; great mother 95 

And starting from the hollows of the earth 

More multitudinous every moment, rend 

Their way from them — what a joy to roam 

An equal among mightiest energies; 

And haply sometimes with articulate voice, 

Amid the deafening tumult, scarcely heard 

By him that utters it, exclaim aloud, 

'Rage on ye elements ! let moon and stars 

Their aspects lend, and mingle in their turn 

With this commotion (ruinous though it be) 

From day to night, from night to day, prolonged !' " 

"When Withers,* in words which Wordsworth has fondly 
quoted, says of his muse : 

"By the murmur of a spring, 
Or the least bough's rustelling; 
By a daisy whose leaves spread, 
Shut when Titan goes to bed; 
Or a shady bush or tree — 
She could more infuse in me 
Than all Nature's beauties can 
In some other wiser man" 

he felt already, as Wordsworth after him, that Nature is no mere 
collection of phenomena, but infuses into her least approaches 
some sense of her mysterious whole. Passages like this, how- 
ever, must not be too closely pressed. The mystic element in 
English literature has run for the most part into other channels ; 
and when, after Pope's reign of artificiality and convention, 
attention was redirected to the phenomena of Nature by Collins, 
Beattie, Thomson, Crabbe, Cowper, Burns, and Scott, it was in 
a spirit of admiring observation rather than of an intimate wor- 
ship. Sometimes, as for the most part in Thomson, we have 
mere picturesqueness — a reproduction of Nature for the mere 
pleasure of reproducing her — a kind of stock-taking of her habit- 
ual effects. Or sometimes, as in Burns we have a glowing spirit 



* W. F. H. Myers: William Wordsworth, English Men of Letters. Harper & Bros., 
N. Y. 



96 THE GREAT MOTHER 

which looks on Nature with a side glance, and uses her as an 
accessory to the expression of human love and woe. Cowper 
sometimes contemplated her as a whole, but only as affording a 
proof of the wisdom and goodness of a personal Creator. 

Fiona Macleod 

Fiona Macleod (William Sharp) ought to be mentioned in 
the same breath with Wordsworth. He felt the common heart of 
Nature and must have had many an hour with the Great Mother. 
He was a poet and a Nature-Mystic and here are some of his 
thoughts : 

"We speak of Mother Nature but we do not discern the living 
truth behind our words. How few of us have the vision of this 
great brooding Mother, whose garment is the earth and the sea, 
whose head is pillowed among the stars ; she who, with death and 
sleep as her familiar shapes, soothes and rests all the weariness 
of the world, from the waning leaf to the beating pulse, from the 
brief span of a human heart to the furrowing of granite brows 
by the uninterrupted sun, the hounds of rain and wind, and the 
untrammeled airs of heaven. 

"Not cruel, relentless, impotently anarchic, choatically potent, 
this Mater Genetrix. We see her thus, who are flying threads 
in the loom she weaves. But she is patient, abiding, certain, in- 
violate, and silent ever. It is only when we come to this vision 
of her whom we call Isis, or Hera, or Orchil, or one of a hun- 
dred other names, our unknown Earth-Mother, that men and 
women will know each other aright, and go hand in hand along 
the road of life without striving to crush, to subdue, to ursurp, 
to retaliate, to separate. 

"That we are intimately one with Nature is a cosmic truth we 
are all slowly approaching. It is not only the dog, it is not only 
the wild beast and the wood-dove, that are our close kindred, but 
the green tree and the green grass, the blue wave and the flowing 
wind, the flower of a day and the granite peak of an aeon — 
We are woven in one loom, and the Weaver thrids our being with 
the sweet influences, not only of the Pleiades, but of the living 
world of which each is no more than a multi-colored thread : as, 
in turn, He thrids the winding wind with the inarticulate cry, 
the yearning, the passion, the pain, of that bitter clan, the Human. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 97 

"Truly, we are all one. It is a common tongue we speak, 
though the wave has its own whisper, and the wind its own sigh, 
and the lip of man its word, and the heart of woman its silence. 

"A seer told him of Orchil, the dim goddess who is under the 
brown earth, in a va%t cavern, where she weaves at two looms. 
With one hand she weaves life upward through the grass; with 
the other she weaves death downward through the mould ; and the 
sound of the weaving is Eternity, and the name of it in the green 
world is Time. And, through all, Orchil weaves the weft of Eter- 
nal Beauty, that passeth not, though its soul is Change. 

"Is it because the wild-wood passion of Pan still lingers in our 
hearts, because still in our minds the voice of Syrinx floats in 
melancholy music, the music of regret and longing, that for most 
of us there is so potent a spell in running waters? We associate 
them with loneliness and beauty. Beauty and solitude — these are 
still the shepherd-kings of the imagination, to compel our wander- 
ing memories, our thoughts, our dreams. 

"In the Beauty of this World lies the ultimate redemption of 
our mortality. When we shall become at-one with Nature in a 
sense profounder even than the poetic imaginings of most of us, 
we shall understand what now we fail to discern. 

"For nothing is more strange than the life of natural symbols. 
We may discern in them a new illusion, a new meaning. The 
symbol of the Lily has been the chalice of the world's tears ; the 
symbol of the Rose, the passion of uplifted hearts and of hearts 
on fire; in the symbol of the Cross has dwelled, like fragrance in 
a flower, the human Soul. The salt, mutable, and yet unchanging 
sea has been the phantom in which empires have seen Time like 
a shadow, the mirage by which kings have wept and nations been 
amorous in a great pride. The Wind, that no man has seen, on 
whose rushing mane no hand has been laid, and in whose mouth 
has been set no bridle since the world swung out of chaos on 
chariots of flame, — has not that solitary and dread creature of 
the deeps been fashioned in our minds to an image of the Ever- 
lasting, and in our hearts been shaped to the semblance of a 
Spirit? 

"For now I see clearly that the chief end of the body is to 
enable the soul to come into intimate union with the natural law 




V 



98 THE GREAT MOTHER 

of Form, and be at one with all created life and yet be for ever 
itself and individual. By itself the soul would only vainly aspire ; 
it has to learn to remember, to become one with the wind and the 
grass and with all that lives and moves ; to take its life from the 
root of the body, and its green life from the mind, and its flower 
and fragrance from what it may of itself obtain, not only from 
this world, but from its own dews, its own rainbows, dawn 
stars and evening stars, and vast incalculable fans of time and 
death. 

"It is in 'the desert,' whether in the wilderness of the un- 
peopled waste or in that of the mind where the imagination wan- 
ders like a lonely hunter on the trail of the obscure and the 
unknown, that the whisper of Destiny is supremely audible. It 
is on the eddying air. It is in the sigh of the grass. The green 
branch whispers it. It is in the brown leaf, on the grey wind. 

"Glad am I that wherever and whenever I listen intently I 
can hear the looms of Nature weaving beauty and music. But 
some of the most beautiful things are learned otherwise — by 
hazard, in the Way of Pain, or at the Gate of Sorrow. 

"As the old Celtic poets tell us, the noise of the sunfire on the 
waves at daybreak is audible to those who have ears to hear. 
So may be heard the sudden rush and sweep of the sunbeams 
when they first stream upon a wood. The boughs, the branches, 
the feathery or plume-like summits of the trees do homage at that 
moment, when the Gates of Wonder open for a few seconds on 
the unceasing miracle of Creation. The leaves quiver, or curl 
upward, even though there be no breath of air. It is then that 
crows, rooks, wood-doves, and, on the heights, the hawks and 
eagles, lean their breasts against the sunflood and soar far for- 
ward and downward on the wide-poised motionless wings. 

"At sunrise he came upon an old man, standing looking sea- 
ward with his bonnet removed from his long white locks; and 
upon his speaking to Seumas (when he saw he was not 'at his 
prayers') was answered, 'Every morning like this I take off my 
hat to the beauty of the world. ' " 

Swinburne 

Let me quote something from Swinburne's Mater triumphalis 



the; great mother 99 

and ask my reader to read the balance in the poem as issued in 
full. 

Mother of man's time-travelling generations, 
Breath of his nostrils, heart-blood of his heart, 
God above all gdds, worshipped by all nations, 
Light above light, law beyond law thou art. 

Thy face is a sword smiting in sunder 
Shadows and chains and dreams and iron things : 
The sea is dumb before thy face, the thunder 
Silent, the skies are narrower than thy wings. 

Angels and Gods, spirit and sense, thou takest 

In thy right hand as drops of dust or dew, 

The temples and the towers of time, thou breakest, 

All we have wandered from thy ways, have hidden 
Eyes from thy glory and ears from calls they heard; 

Loved and renounced and worshipped and denied thee, 
As though thou wert but as another god. 

Oh Thou, the resurrection and redemption, 
The godhead and the manhood and the life. 

Death is subdued to thee, and hell's bands broken; 
Where thou art only is heaven ; who hears not thee, 
Time shall not hear him ; when men's names are spoken 
A nameless sign of death shall his name be. 

The years are as thy garments, the world's ages 
As sandals bound and loosed from thy swift feet. 



I am thine harp between thine hands, O Mother ! 

All my strong chords are strained with love of thee. 

I am the trumpet at thy lips, thy clarion 

Full of thy cry, sonorous with thy breath. 

Thou art the player whose organ-keys are thunders 

And I beneath thy foot the pedal prest. 




ioo the; great mother 

Richard Jefferies 

Richard Jefferies' name brings sad memories to mind. For a 
lover of Nature, an idyllist of the country, to fall down slowly 
consumed by life's roadside, seems anomalous, but such was his 
fate. Color and light and form were magic to him and his eyes 
of communion with the Great Mother. 

So it has ever been with me, (he tells us), by day or night, 
summer or winter ; beneath the trees the heart feels nearer to that 
depth of life which the far sky means. The rest of spirit found 
only in beauty, ideal and pure, comes there because the distance 
seems within touch of thought. 

"Nature sets no value upon life, neither mine nor of the larks 
that sang years ago. The earth is all and all to me, but I am 
nothing to the earth; it is bitter to know this before you are 
dead. These delicious violets are sweet for themselves ; they are 
not shaped and colored and gifted with the exquisite proportion 
and adjustment of odor and hue for me. 

"Earth is always beautiful — always. Without color, leaf or 
sunshine, or song of bird and flutter of butterfly's wing; without 
anything sensuous, without advantage or gliding of summer — the 
power is ever there. 

"Nature flings treasures abroad, puffs them with open lips 
along on every breeze, piles up lavish layers of them in the free 
open air, packs countless numbers together in the needles of a 
fir-tree. Prodigality and superfluity are stamped on everything 
she does. The ear of wheat returns a hundredfold the grain 
from which it grew. The surface of the earth offers to us far 
more than we can consume — the grains, the seeds, the fruits, 
the animals, the abounding products are beyond the power of all 
the human race to devour. They can, too, be multiplied a thou- 
sandfold. There is no natural lack. Whenever there is lack 
among us it is from artificial causes, which intelligence should 
remove. From the littleness and meanness, the niggardliness 
forced upon us by circumstances, what a relief to turn aside to 
the exceeding plenty of Nature! There are no bounds to it, 
there is no comparison to parallel it, so great is this generosity. 

"The forest is gone ; but the spirit of Nature stays, and can be 
found by those who search for it. Dearly as I love the open air, 



THE GREAT MOTHER IOl 

I cannot regret the medieval days. I do not wish them back 
again ; I would sooner fight in the foremost ranks of Time. Nor 
do we need them, for the spirit of Nature stays, and will always 
be here, no matter to how high a pinnacle of thought the human 
mind may attain; still the sweet air, and the hills, and the sea, 
and the sun, will always be with us. 

"Those original grains of true thought were found beside the 
stream, the sea, in the sunlight, at the shady verge of woods. 
Let us leave this beating and turning over of empty straw; let 
us return to the stream and the hills ; let us ponder by night in 
view of the stars. 

"Let me have wider feelings, more extended sympathies, let 
me feel with all living things, rejoice and praise with them. Let 
me have deeper knowledge, a nearer insight, a more reverent con- 
ception. Let me see the mystery of life — the secret of the sap 
as it rises in the tree — the secret of the blood as it courses through 
the vein. Reveal the broad earth and the ends of it — make the 
majestic ocean open to the eye down to its inmost recesses. Ex- 
pand the mind till it grasps the idea of the unseen forces which 
hold the globe suspended and draw the vast suns and stars 
through space. Let it see the life, the organisms which dwell in 
those great worlds, and feel with them their hopes and joys and 
sorrows. Ever upwards, onwards, wider, deeper, broader, till 
capable of all — all. 

"Only by walking hand in hand with Nature, only by a rever- 
ent and loving study of the mysteries for ever around us, is it 
possible to disabuse the mind of the narrow view, the contracted 
belief that time is now and eternity to-morrow. Eternity is to- 
day." 

Emerson 

I must mention Ralph Waldo Emerson because his books are 
among "the books that nourish the world." But I would be some- 
what astray if I call him a typical Nature-lover. His love and un- 
derstanding of Nature was indirect and his feelings had passed 
through his intellectual fire. Nevertheless if Emerson had known 
the gospel which the Great Mother now has proclaimed, he would 
have preached it with much intensity, I think. 

Here are some of his most prominent thoughts. Many more 



102 the; great mother 

quotations could easily be furnished, but my space allows no 
more. 

"In the absence of man, we turn to Nature, which stands next. 
In the divine order, intellect is primary ; Nature, secondary ; it is 
the memory of the mind. That which once existed in intellect as 
pure law, has now taken body as Nature. It existed already in 
the mind in solution ; now it has been precipitated, and the bright 
sediment is the world. We can never be quite strangers or infer- 
iors in Nature. It is flesh of our flesh, and bone of our bone. 
But we no longer hold it by the hand ; we have lost our miracu- 
lous power ; our arm is no longer as strong as the frost ; nor our 
will equivalent to gravity and the elective attractions. Yet we can 
use Nature as a convenient standard, and the meter of our rise 
and fall. It has this advantage as a witness, it cannot be debauched. 
When man curses, Nature still testifies to truth and love. We 
may, therefore safely study the mind in Nature, because we can- 
not gaze on it in mind; as we explore the face of the sun in a 
pool, when our eyes cannot brook his direct splendors. 

"The method of Nature : who could ever analyze it ? That rush- 
ing stream will not stop to be observed. We can never surprise 
Nature in a corner; never find the end of a thread; never tell 
where to set the first stone. The bird hastens to lay her egg: 
the egg hastens to be a bird. The wholeness we admire in the 
order of the world, is the result of infinite distribution. Its 
smoothness is the smoothness of the pitch of the cataract. Its 
permanence is a perpetual choation. Every natural fact is an 
emanation, and from that which it emanates is an emanation also, 
and from every emanation is a new emanation. If anything could 
stand still, it would be crushed and dissipated by the torrent it 
resisted, and if it were a mind, would be crazed; as insane per- 
sons are those who hold fast to one thought, and do not flow 
with the course of Nature. Not the cause, but an ever novel ef- 
fect, Nature descends always from above. It is unbroken obed- 
ience. The beauty of these fair objects is imported to them 
from a metaphysical and eternal spring. In all animal and vege- 
table forms, the physiologist concedes that no chemistry, no me- 
chanics, can account for the facts, but a mysterious principle of 
life must be assumed. 



THE GREAT MOTHER IO3 

"All is nascent, infant. When we are dizzied with the arithme- 
tic of the savant toiling to compute the length of her line, the 
return of her curve, we are steadied by the perception that a 
great deal is doing; that all seems just begun; remote aims are in 
active accomplishment We can point nowhere to anything final ; 
but tendency appears on all hands: planet, system, constellation, 
total Nature is growing like a field of maize in July; is becoming 
somewhat else; is in rapid metamorphosis. The embryo does 
not more strive to be man, than yonder burr of light we call a. 
nebula tends to be a ring, a comet, a globe, and parent of new 
stars. 

"But Nature seems further to reply, 'I have ventured so great 
a stake as my success, in no single creature. I have not yet 
arrived at any end. The gardener aims to produce a fine peach 
or pear, but my aim is the health of the whole tree — root, stem, 
leaf, flower, and seed, — and by no means the pampering of a 
monsterous pericarp at the expense of all the other functions.' 

"And because ecstacy is the law and cause of Nature, there- 
fore you cannot interpret it in too high and deep a sense. Nature 
represents the best meaning of the wisest man. 

The rounded world is fair to see, 
Nine times folded in mystery ; 
Though baffled seers cannot impart 
The secret of its laboring heart. 
Throb thine with Nature's throbbing breast 
And all is clear from east to west. 
Spirit that lurks each form within 
Beckons to spirit of its kin; 
Self-kindled every atom glows, 
And hints the future which it owes. 

"Nature cannot be surprised in undress. Beauty breaks in 
everywhere. 

"Nature is loved by what is best in us. It is loved as the City 
of God, although, or rather because, there is no citizen. The sun- 
set is unlike anything that is underneath it; it wants men. And 
the beauty of Nature must always seem unreal and mocking un- 
til the landscape has human figures that are as good as itself. 
8 



104 TH E GREAT MOTHER 

"Nature may be selfishly studied as a trade; astronomy to the 
selfish becomes astrology; psychology, mesmerism (with intent 
to show where our spoons are gone) ; and anatomy and physiol- 
ogy become phrenology and palmistry. 

"Nature is always consistent, though she feigns to contravene 
her own laws. She keeps her laws, and seems to transcend them. 
She arms and equips an animal to find its place and living in the 
earth, and, at the same time, she arms and equips another animal 
to destroy it. 

"There is throughout Nature something mocking, something 
that leads us on and on, but arrives nowhere, keeps no faith with 
us. All promise outruns the performance. We live in a system 
of approximations. 

"What shall we say of this omnipresent appearance of that 
first projectile impulse, of this flattery and balking of so many 
well-meaning creatures ? Must we not suppose somewhere in the 
universe a slight treachery and derision? And are we not en- 
gaged to a serious resentment of this use that is made of us? 
Are we tickled trout, and fools of Nature? One look at the face 
of heaven and earth lays all petulance at rest, and soothes us to 
wiser convictions. To the intelligent, Nature converts itself into 
a vast promise, and will not be rashly explained. Her secret is 
untold. 

. "Nature is the incarnation of a thought, and turns to a thought 
again, as ice becomes water and gas. The world is mind precip- 
itated, and the volitle essence is forever escaping again into the 
state of free thought. 

"At the gates of the forest, the surprised man of the world 
is forced to leave his city estimates of great and small, wise and 
foolish. The knapsack of custom falls off his back with the first 
step he makes into these precincts. Here is sanctity which shames 
our religions, and reality which discredits our heroes. Here we 
find Nature to be the circumstance which dwarfs every other cir- 
cumstance, and judges like a god all men that come to her. 

"The first in time and the first in importance of the influences 
upon the mind is that of Nature. Every day, the sun ; and, after 
sunset, Night and her stars. Ever the wind blows; ever the 
grass grows. Every day, men and women conversing, behold- 



the; great mother 105 

ing and beholden. The scholar is he of all men whom this spec- 
tacle most engages. He must settle its value in his mind. What 
is Nature to him ? There is never a beginning, there is never an 
end, to the inexplicable continuity of this web of God, but always 
circular power returning into itself. Therein it resembles his own 
spirit, whose beginning, whose ending, he never can find, — so 
entire, so boundless. Far, too, as her splendors shine, system on 
system shooting like rays, upward, downward, without centre, 
without circumference, — in the mass and in the particle, Nature 
hastens to render account of herself to the mind. 

"Who loves Nature ? Who does not ? Is it only poets, and men 
of leisure and cultivation, who live with her ? No ; but also hunt- 
ers, farmers, grooms, and butchers, though they express their 
affection in their choice of life not in choice of words. The 
writer wonders what the coachman or the hunter values in riding, 
in horses, and dogs. It is not superficial qualities. When you 
talk with him, he holds these at as slight a rate as you. His 
worship is sympathetic : he has no definitions, but he is command- 
ed in Nature by the living power which he feels to be there 
present. No imitation, or playing of these things, would content 
him; he loves the earnest of the north-wind, of rain, of stone, 
and wood, and iron. A beauty not explicable is dearer than a 
beauty which we can see to the end of. It is Nature the symbol, 
Nature certifying the supernatural, body overflowed by life, 
which he worships with coarse, but sincere rites." 

Thoreau 

Thoreau lived with Nature, yet he was not a Nature-lover of 
much enthusiasm. He understood much of the Great Mother's 
methods both with himself personally and in the Open, but he did 
not dare to ask for the Great Embrace. He was satisfied with 
her smiles and a kiss now and then. They were friends, but not 
lovers. 

"Very few men can speak of Nature, for instance, with any 
truth. They overstep her modesty somehow or other, and confer 

no favor. They do not speak a good word for her The 

surliness with which the woodchopper speaks of his woods, hand- 
ling them indifferently with his axe, is better than the mealy- 
mouthed enthusiasm of the lover of Nature. 



106 THE GREAT MOTHER 

"The world is well kept ; no rubbish accumulates ; the morning 
air is clear even at this day, and no dust has settled on the grass. 
Behold how the evening now steals over the fields, the shadows 
of the trees creeping farther and farther into the meadow, and 
ere long the stars will come to bathe in these retired waters. 
Her undertakings are secure and never fail. If I were awakened 
from a deep sleep, I should know which side of the meridian the 
sun might be by the aspect of Nature, and by the chirp of the 
crickets, and yet no painter can paint this difference. The land- 
scape contains a thousand dials which indicate the natural divis- 
ions of time, the shadows of a thousand styles point to the hour. 

"The universe constantly and obediently answers to our con- 
ceptions; whether we travel fast or slow, the track is laid for 
us. 

"The indescribable innocence and beneficence of Nature, — 
of sun and wind and rain, of summer and winter, — such health, 
such cheer, they afford forever! and such sympathy have they 
ever with our race, that all Nature would be affected, and the 
sun's brightness fade, and the winds would sigh humanely, and 
the clouds rain tears, and the woods shed their leaves and put 
on mourning in midsummer, if any man should ever for a just 
cause grieve. Shall I not have intelligence with the earth? Am 
I not partly leaves and vegetable mould myself? 

"We can never have enough of Nature. We must be refreshed 
by the sight of inexhaustible vigor, vast and Titanic features, the 
sea-coast with its wrecks, the wilderness with its living and its 
decaying trees, the thunder-cloud, and the rain which lasts three 
weeks and produces freshets. 

"To anticipate, not the sunrise and the dawn merely, but, if 
possible, Nature herself ! How many mornings, summer and 
winter, before yet any neighbor was stirring about his business, 
have I been about mine! No doubt many of my townspeople 
have met me returning from this enterprise, farmers starting 
for Boston in the twilight, or wood-choppers going to their 
work. It is true, I never assisted the sun materially in his ris- 
ing, but, doubt not, it was of the last importance only to be pres- 
ent at it. 

"Let us spend one day as deliberately as Nature, and not be 



THE GREAT MOTHER 107 

thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that 
falls on the rails. Let us rise early and fast, or breakfast, gently 
and without perturbation ; let company come and let company go, 
let the bells ring and the children cry, — determined to make a 
day of it. , 

"Surely the fates are forever kind, though Nature's laws are 
more immutable than any despot's, yet to man's daily life they 
rarely seem rigid, but permit him to relax with license in sum- 
mer weather. He is not harshly reminded of the things he may 
not do. She is very kind and liberal to all men of vicious habits, 
and certainly does not deny them quarter ; they do not die with- 
out priest. Still they maintain life along the way, keeping this 
side the Styx, still hearty, still resolute, 'never better in their 
lives' ; and again, after a dozen years have elapsed, they start up 
from behind a hedge, asking for work and wages for able-bodied 
men. 

"We would not be always soothing and taming Nature, break- 
ing the horse and the ox, but sometimes ride the horse wild and 
chase the buffalo. The Indian's intercourse with Nature is at 
least such as admits of the greatest independence of each. If 
he is somewhat of a stranger in her midst, the gardener is too 
much of a familiar. There is something vulgar and foul in the 
latter's closeness to his mistress, something noble and cleanly in 
the former's distance." 

Whitman 

Walt Whitman was of the soil, primitive and picturesque, and 
not metaphysical. He was a tramp of the highroads and delight- 
fully natural, but no philosopher of Nature, no Nature-Mystic. 
The world was too much with him for that. He was a Kosmos, 
he said, and his "Leaves of Grass" mere Open Air, but he could 
not have found the Great Mother in the desert, for instance. A 
visit to the woods was an incident, but not a retreat. Here are 
some of his Nature-Thoughts. 

"After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, 
conviviality, love, and so on — have found that none of them finally 
satisfy, or permanently wear — what remains? Nature remains. 

"Perhaps the inner never-lost rapport we hold with earth, light, 
air, trees, etc., is not to be realized through eyes and mind only, 



108 THE GREAT MOTHER 

but through the whole corporeal body, which I will not have 
blinded or bandaged any more than the eyes. Sweet, sane, still 
Nakedness in Nature! — ah, if poor, sick, prurient humanity in 
cities might really know you once more! Is not nakedness then 
indecent? No, not inherently. It is your thought, your sophis- 
tication, your fear, your respectability, that is indecent. There 
come moods when these clothes of ours are not only too irksome 
to wear, but are themselves indecent. Perhaps indeed he or she to 
whom the free exhilarating ecstacy of nakedness in Nature has 
never been eligible (and how many thousands there are!) has 
not really known what purity is — nor what faith or art or health 
really is. 

"Mountains constantly in sight in the apparently near distance, 
veil'd slightly, but still clear and very grand — their cones, colors, 
sides, distinct against the sky — hundreds, it seem'd thousands, 
interminable necklaces of them, their tops and slopes hazed more 
or less slightly in that blue-grey, under the autumn sun, for over 
a hundred miles — the most spiritual show of objective Nature I 
ever beheld, or ever thought possible. 

"In this dull scene, (as most folks would call it,) why am I so 
(almost) happy here and alone? Why should any intrusion, even 
from people I like, spoil the charm? But am I alone? Doubtless 
there comes a time — perhaps it has come to me — when one feels 
through his whole being, and pronouncedly the emotional part, 
that identity between himself subjectively and Nature objectively 
which Schelling and Fichte are so fond of pressing. How is it, 
I know not, but I often realize a presence here — in clear moods 
I am certain of it, and neither chemistry nor reasoning nor 
esthetics, will give the least explanation. 

"I am convinced there are hours of Nature, especially of the 
atmosphere, mornings and evenings, address'd to the soul. Night 
transcends, for that purpose, what the proudest day can do. 

"The greatest lessons of Nature through the universe are per- 
haps the lessons of variety and freedom. 

"Nature consists not only in itself, objectively, but at least just 
as much in its subjective reflection from the person, spirit, age, 
looking at it, in the midst of it, and absorbing it — faithfully sends 
back the characteristic beliefs of the time or individual — takes, 



THE GREAT MOTHER IO9 

and readily gives again, the physiognomy of any nation or litera- 
ture — falls like a great elastic veil on a face, or like a molding 
plaster on a statue. 

"I have invariably found coming to the front three prevailing 
personal traits, to be named here for brevity's sake under the 
heads of Good-Nature, Decorum, and Intelligence. (I make 
Good-Nature first as it deserves to be — it is a splendid resultant 
of all the rest, like health or fine weather.)" 

A French Poet : Maurice de Guerin* 

Nature always inspires, but does not always satisfy the long- 
ings she creates. In rare cases she seems capricious and throws 
her apples at the feet of the lazy, but as a rule, she demands 
devotion, work in the sweat of the brow, before she opens her 
horn of plenty. Woe unto that child of hers who demands con- 
sistency in her and does not see, that he himself alone can show 
that. 

"Know, man hath all which Nature hath, but more. 
And in that more lie all his hopes of good." 

Maurice de Guerin is an example upon that unhappy lot which 
is man's, when he can not come to rest either in Nature or in 
himself. He has confessed and laid open his heart. Said he: 
"Which is the true God? The God of the cities or the God of the 
deserts? To which to go? Long-cherished tastes, impulses of 
the heart, accidents of life, decide the choice. The man of the 
cities laughs at the strange dreams of the eremites : these, on the 
other hand, exult at their separation, as finding themselves, like 
the islands of the great ocean, far from continents and bathed 
by unknown waves. The most to be pitied are those who, flung 
between these two, stretch their arms first to the one, then to 
the other." 

De Guerin is a soul torn by indecision ; full of poetry, but weak 
in expression; a spiritual appearance that can find no home 
among men and yet lacks that frankness with Nature which 
would reduce a dreamy temper to a loyal friendship. 

"Every time we allow ourselves to penetrate into Nature, our 



* Compare my article in Metaphysical Magazine, April, 1900, Some Nature Poets. 



110 THE GREAT MOTHER 

soul opens to the most intense impressions. No matter whether 
Nature be pale, gray, cold or rainy as in the autumn and winter, 
there is something in her which stirs the soul in the most secret 
recesses as well as on the surface. She awakens a thousand 
recollections apparently without connection with her own ex- 
ternals, yet these undoubtedly stand in direct relation to the Soul 
of Nature through sympathies unknown to us. To-day I realized 
such a marvelous power while lying in a wood of beeches breath- 
ing the soft spring air." A man that writes thus after having 
had such experiences is not made for anything like the Trappist 
admonition : Frere, il faut mourir. He has studied the marvel of 
the leaf-bud of the beech, which is packed so compactly that it 
might almost go through the eye of a needle ; he has looked 
through the yellow-green foliage unrivaled by any other tree 
of the forest and he has seen how "all Nature widens upward." 
He has seen in the beech the natural origin and type of the clus- 
tered pillars of a Gothic cathedral and instinctively he has prefer- 
red the living church to that of stone. He has learned that the 
effects of the green light of that forest-church is far more mystic 
than the dim and dull yellow light of altar candles. Yet, this 
poor soul, who longed "to wander at his own sweet will and to 
breathe in all the life and love which ferments in Nature," 
cries when he comes home. 

One of the most charming parts of his poem, "The Centaur" 
is the chapter on Cybele, the Great Mother, variously called 
Diana, Isis. Mylitta and the Celestial Venus. It runs like this : 

"I wandered about as I felt like and as the rivers do; every- 
where I perceived the presence of the Cybele, whether in the 
bed of the valleys or on the tops of the mountains. But when 
Night, filled with the charm of the gods, overtook me on the 
slopes of the mountains, she guided me to the mouth of the cav- 
erns and there tranquillized me as she stills the billows of the 
sea. Lying across the threshold of my cave and partly hidden in 
it, but with my head under the open sky, I watched the spectacle 
of the dark. It is said, that the sea-gods quit their places under 
the deep during the hours of darkness and that they seat them- 
selves upon the promontories and that they look out upon the 
expanse of the waters. In like manner, I kept watch and looked 



THE GREAT MOTHER III 

out over the expanse of life. The beach of the sea never loses 
its wetness, neither did the mountains afar off in the West lose 
their outlines, mountain summits, naked pure, still stood out boldly 
against the pale clearness. I saw the god Pan descend, and, at 
another time, the choir of mystic divinities; I saw some moun- 
tain-nymphs charm-struck by the night." 

The simplicity of this narrative is so great that we marvel 
at it ; it takes us time to realize it and the scenery is unknown to 
most readers. How many have spent the night alone out of doors 
on some mountain promontory and heard the heartbeat of Nature 
or understood "the choir of mystic divinities"? One must be 
something like the Centaur, an offspring of Ixion and a cloud, 
half god and half man; half man and half beast, to live such a 
life. Yet some have perhaps had an experience of something 
not altogether human if they in the night suddenly came up 
against rocks on the outskirts of a deep forest. Perhaps they 
have felt that they were observed by somebody in there, in the 
dark, among the trees and the rocks. Perhaps it was the Cen- 
taur or whatever they choose to name that mysterious Presence 
which undeniably meets one in such places. 

From beginning to end of this prose-poem we feel the near- 
ness of an elementary spirit. In the opening verses we are told how 
the Centaur "studies" by tossing his arms or by galloping back- 
wards and forwards and at the close he says : "I feel myself per- 
ishing and passing quickly away like a snowball floating on the 
stream; and soon shall I be mingled with the waters which flow 
in the vast bosom of Earth." Such is the spirit of Maurice de 
Guerin and such is his experiences in Nature. There is but little 
of the man in it ; it is all an opening of the heart of Nature. 

"01 c' est un beau spectacle a ravir la pensee"* 

"this vast circulation of life carried on in the ample bosom of 
Nature ; life which springs from an invisible fountain, and swells 
the veins of this universe. Obeying its law of ascension, it 
mounts, ever purifying and ennobling itself, from kingdom to 
kingdom, to pulsate at last in the heart of man, the centre, where 
from every quarter its thousand currents meet. There it is 



* The Journal of Maurice de Guirtn. Edited by G. S. Trebutian. Translated by E. T. 
Eischer, Leypoldt and Hall, New York, 1867. 



112 THE GREAT MOTHER 

brought under the touch of Divinity; there, as upon the altar 
burning with incense, it exhales itself, with sacrifical mystery, in 
the bosom of God. Methinks there should be profound and 
marvellous things to be said upon the sacrifice of Nature in the 
heart of man, and the eucharistic offering made in that same 
heart. The simultaneousness of these two sacrifices, and the 
absorption of the one in the other on the same altar, that rendez- 
vous in humanity, of God, and all created things, should open to 
view, it seems to me, grand heights and depths, sublimitas et 
profundum. 

"The love which speaks, sings and wails in one part of creation, 
reveals itself in the other half under the form of flowers. All 
this efflorescence, so rich in form, in color, and in perfume, with 
which the fields are resplendent, is the expression of love; it is 
love itself which celebrates its sweet mysteries in the bosom 
of each flower. The blooming bough, the bird which alights 
thereon to sing or to build its nest, the man who regards both 
branch and bird, are all animated by the same principle in dif- 
ferent degrees of perfection. I read in Herder that the flowers 
perish immediately after fructification; that the birds lose their 
song, their blitheness, and some of them the brilliant colors of 
their plumage after the season of nests, and that man, after the 
period of passions, declines rapidly towards old age. There is 
food for meditation in this law of decay so intimately connected 
with the law of love and reproduction. 

"Let us abjure the worship of idols, let us turn our backs on 
all the deities of art, decked with paint and false finery, on all 
these images, with mouths that speak not. Let us adore Nature, 
frank, ingenious, and in no respect exclusive. Great God! how 
can men make poetry in face of the broad poem of the universe? 
Your poetry! the Lord has made it for you; it is the created 
world. Think you, you hold deeper meanings? 

"If it were possible to identify ourselves with spring, to carry 
this thought to the point of believing that all the life, all the 
love which leavens Nature culminates in ourselves; to feel our- 
selves at once flower, verdure, bird, song, freshness, elasticity, 
delight, serenity, what would become of me? There are mo- 
ments when, by dint of concentrating one's thoughts on this idea, 



THE GREAT MOTHER 11$ 

and of gazing intently on Nature, one seems to experience some 
such thing. 

"All the noises of Nature : the winds, those fearful blasts from 
an unknown mouth, which play upon the numberless instruments 
of Nature, whether f in the plains, on the mountains, along the 
hollows of the valleys, or massed in the orchestra of the forest; 
the waters, whose scale of voices ranges over so infinite a com- 
pass, from the soft rippling of a fountain over the moss to the 
grand harmonies of the ocean ; the thunder, the voice of that sea 
which heaves over our heads; the dry leaves, which rustle to a 
passing human tread or that of a playful breeze; in short (for 
one must put an end to this enumeration, which might be in- 
finite), this continual utterance of sounds, this ever-undulating 
murmur of the elements, expands my thoughts into strange rever- 
ies, and throws me into mazes whence there is no issue. The 
voice of Nature has acquired such empire over me that I rarely 
succeed in freeing myself from the habitual pre-occupation which 
she imposes, and attempt in vain to feign deafness. But to 
wake at midnight, with the shrieks of the storm, to be assailed in 
the darkness by a savage and furious harmony which subverts 
the peaceful sway of night, is something incomparable in the 
experience of strange impressions. It is a terrible delight. 

"The germinating grain puts forth life in two contrary direc- 
tions, the plumule grows upward, the rootlet downward : I would 
like to be the insect that takes up its quarters and lives in the 
rootlet. I would take my post at the extreme tip of the roots and 
watch the powerful action of the pores drawing in life; I would 
observe the life passing from the fruitful bosom of some earthly 
atom into the pores, which, like so many mouths, evoke and woo 
it by melodious calls. I would be witness of the ineffable love 
with which life rushes to the arms of the being who invokes it, 
and at the joy of that being. I would be present at their embraces. 

"I dwell with the interior elements of things, I climb the rays 
of the stars, and the currents of the streams, to the very bosom 
of the mysteries of their generation. I am admitted by Nature 
to the inner sanctuary of her sacred abodes to the point whence 
issues Life Universal; there, I detect the cause of motion, and 
I hear the first song of created life in all its freshness." 



V 



114 TH E GREAT MOTHER 

Illusions and the Great Mother 

This is from my daybook: "Montclair, N. J., Feb. 15, 1899. 

"This morning as I jumped out of bed at 6.20 and looked out 
of my window which faces west, I saw the hills and Nevin's 
house all ablaze. 'A fire,' I called out, but at once saw my mis- 
take; there was no red glow in the light and no smoke, though 
the morning was dark enough to hide smoke if there had been 
any. It was the moon setting in clouds of fog and presenting an 
imitation, however weak, of the sun's evening doing. I had 
never observed it before. 

"Short as the spectacle was as regards time, and small as it 
was regards space, it was brilliant in its way: a cold brilliancy 
and an illusion, but it left an impression upon me, which lasted 
all day and even now at evening when I write this, I am under its 
spell." 

Though this "illusion" was an illusion as an illusion is com- 
monly explained, I would not be without the experience : I learned 
reality by it, viz., I was awakened and set into a psychological 
frame of observation of a high order; an order new to me. I 
did not merely learn to be careful of what I see and watch the 
senses in order to deny them, such as the Buddist priest said we 
must. On the contrary I found a new use for the senses. 

My experience was as rich as one of those flashes of light 
which strikes us sometimes and which leaves the impression that 
Something Great has been present and has passed by. When the 
Great Mother passes by, she always leaves such an impression. 

Evil and the Great Mother's Methods 

Winter is the season which preeminently draws the mind to 
the sub-liminal and to the super-liminal. It offers comparatively 
few attractions out doors and drives us so to say to look upon 
the natural life at a distance. Crushing cold checks everything 
and death is a frequent occurrence. Suffering is a common exper- 
ience to all life and the howling wind carries away many a cry of 
pain. 

We come to think of evil and the question arises if it is a nec- 
essity. The metaphysician according to his fundamental ideas 






THE GREAT MOTHER 1 15 

answers the question either as a monist or as a dualist. In the 
role of the first he either denies the fact of evil and wants to con- 
sider it an illusion or he will see it only as an aspect. As a dual- 
ist he looks upon it as a matter of polarity, easily satisfying him- 
self about polarity irj matter and life, which alternately possess 
the kingdom of the world. So far, so good. A shipwreck or a 
great fire are picturesque in aspect, when we, ourselves, are not 
in it. The starving to death of many birds who can not find food 
if a snowstorm lasts twenty-four hours, or, the broken leg of a 
horse who slipped on the ice, call forth a sigh of pity, but the 
sight of that misery is soon forgotten because it did not strike 
us personally. But let "these things" come directly to ourselves, 
we then look differently upon them. When they become personal 
affairs, then arise the moral aspects and we stand in open re- 
bellion. We blame fate, we curse accident, we deny any good in 
the evil and we are too apt to forget our fine philosophy. In fact 
we swing to the opposite pole of our professions and beliefs. 
In spite of ourselves in talk and action the true self is revealed. 
It becomes evident to the clear eyed observer that we have 
acquired but little or nothing of freedom, that Thought and Order 
were only theories or brain vibrations. 

Let us not run away from winter and hide in warm houses. 
Let us not plan to escape the so called evils. Winter is a Stoic 
teacher in freedom and evil is the best agent for the breaking 
down of self-will and forcing it into a true evolution. If there 
were no winter there would be no change of seasons. If there 
were no evil coming to us, there would be no growth, no scale 
by which to determine the quality of our existence. Like the 
battle brings out true honor and manhood, so winter shows the 
degree of inherent strength in out-of-doors Nature, and so does 
evil demonstrate in conscience who we are. 

When a great injustice meets me, I say: "I probably deserve 
this !" When I do not get the "honor" I sought, I ask : "Am I 
really worthy of it?" How often have I not seen that my be- 
setting sins were only my own guardian angels neglected? My 
conscience told me ! My passions turned the wrong way. Not 
being employed in works of freedom they "burned barriers away" 
and let loose Tohu Vobohu. 

There is music in despair; there is glory in failure; there is 



Il6 THE GREAT MOTHER 

honor in disgrace; there are riches in poverty. Conscience can 
prove this and conscience alone tells us who we are. As I am in 
conscience, so I am. This is true at all times, but it takes winter 
cold and evil use to teach us the lesson. 

Nature is full of morals. "The burned child feels the fire" we 
say. Surely, he who has suffered from frostbitten fingers or toes 
will learn to avoid the pain. Is this not teaching? Does not the 
pupil undergo a change, a transformation by such direct lessons 
and the reflections that follow? 

Behold the methods of the Great Mother, how she gives us 
lessons in Personality! 

A Winter Night* 

Serenely still, earth-undefiled, and far 

When mystic darkness spreads her sable hue, 
Is the reverend hush of winter's love-deep blue. 

It covers earth's dark woe, sin's seamy scar, 

With azure depths unsounded save by star. 
Weird Night! Thy solemn silence imbue 
My soul with thoughts unspeakable yet true. 

As vast, unmeasured as thy spaces are. 

On a winter night She seems to teach the philosophy of her 
doings : "vast, unmeasured." 

• Cruelly in Nature and the Great Mother 
Ululation or "lament for the dead ones" is a grueful chapter in 
"Ghostly Japan." In it Lafcadeo Hearn treats of what he calls 
"the ghoulish law of life." Speaking of his dog's howls at night 
he writes: "there are times when her cry seems to me not the 
mere cry of a dog, but the voice of the law itself, — the very 
speech of that Nature so inexplicably called by poets the loving, 
the merciful, the divine! Divine, perhaps, in some unknowable 
ultimate way, — but certainly not merciful, and still more certainly 
not loving. Only by eating each other do things exist! — The 
tenderest affection, the noblest enthusiasm, the purest idealism, 
must be nourished by the eating of flesh and the drinking of 
blood. All life, to sustain itself, must devour life. You may 
imagine yourself divine if you please, — but you have to obey that 



* By Eltwood Pomeroy. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 11/ 

law. Be, if you will, a vegetarian; none the less you must eat 
forms that have feeling and desire. Sterilize your food; and 
digestion stops. You can not even drink without swallowing 
life. Loathe the name as we may, we are cannibals;— all being 
essentially is One; and whether we eat the flesh of a plant, a. 
fish, a reptile, a bird, a mammal, or a man, the ultimate fact is 
the same. — Perpetually we eat the dust of our race,— the sub- 
stance of our ancient selves." 

I wonder if this is entirely correct. Does never any inorganic 
material enter our organisms? Do we human beings not turn 
inorganic matter into organic as much as plants and animals do? 
Certainly we do, and that fact frees Nature from the terrible 
charge that seems to be contained in Hearn's words. 

When the Christian "eats the flesh and drinks the blood," he 
fulfills the law of Nature, which is his first law. Obedience is 
his second law and by living up to it in fulfilling the first law, he 
rises above the low and common. Obedience is of mind, hence 
it is always conscious. 

The bloody sacrifices of past ages were priestly or institutional 
presentations of that law. In ages which were not self-reflective 
and to people who do not think, religious institutions and cere- 
monies are kindergarten methods of teaching. 

All this is Divine as also Hearn admits but not loving and 
merciful as we understand love and mercy. But why should we 
look for such love and mercy in Nature? Because love and 
mercy as we understand them do not exist in Nature, does that 
prove that they do not exist at all in Nature as part of Nature's 
life and purpose? 

Evil, the Martyrdom of Man and the Great Mother* 

From "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship," I quote these words 
of Goethe as a key to the mystery of pain, and thereby to the 
Great Mother. 

Who never ate with tears his bread, 

Who never through night's heavy hours 

Sat weeping on his lonely bed — 
He knows you not, ye heavenly powers ! 



* Compare my article in the Metaphysical Magazine, April, 18 



n8 the: great mother 

Through you the paths of life we gain. 

Ye let poor mortals go astray, 
And then abandon them to pain — 

E'en here the penalty we pay. 

Our age has lost not only many arts which antiquity knew, 
but also that keenness of sense which uses the symbol as a mani- 
festation of the real life; consequently all spiritual perception is 
wellnigh gone. This fact accounts for the erroneous philosophic 
notions entertained about pain. Under the influence of dog- 
matic and bigoted philologists, we derive the word pain from the 
Latin paena punishment, or penalty, and regard it as coming 
upon us from a revengeful God. Metaphysicians of the old 
schools (university doctors) have fallen into the radical error 
of giving reality to pain, which from its very nature it does not 
and can not possess. Physicists come nearer to the truth. 
Physically, they are right when they say: "Pain is the neces- 
sary contrast to pleasure: it ushers us into existence, and is the 
first thing to give us consciousness ; — it is the companion and the 
guardian of human life."* Life comes into existence by means 
of transformation, a metamorphosis, a sudden transit producing 
a condition which, physically, can best be called pain. Indeed, 
the whole creation "groaneth and travaileth" ; and why? That 
it may be redeemed vicariously from sin ? No, but that the New 
Life may be born. There is no real evil. We live only in pro- 
portion to our dying, to our overcoming. 

"The Mother gives us love. Something to love 
She lends us. So, when love is grown 
To ripeness, that on which it throve 
Falls off, and love is left alone." 

Epictetus makes short work of evil. He says :** "As a mark is 
not set up for the purpose of missing the aim, so neither does 
the nature of evil exist in the world." He means, according to 
the old commentator Simplicius, that, as the missing of a mark 
is to fail in intention, so as the world can not be intended as a 



* Charles Bell: "The Hand." Fourth Bridgewater Treatise. Chapter VII. 
** Enchiridion, XXVII. 



the great mother 119 

failure, no evil can exist, for evil is a failure of purpose. What- 
ever there may be of evil in the world, the nature of evil does 
not exist. Another Stoic, Marcus Aurelius* puts the whole 
question of evil thus : 

"What is evil to thee does not subsist in the ruling principle 
of another, nor yet in any turning and mutation of thy^e_orporeal 
covering. Where is it then? It is in that part of thee in which 
subsists the power of forming opinions about evils. Let not this 
power, then, form (such) opinions, and all is well — That which 
happens equally to him who lives contrary to Nature and to 
him who lives according to Nature is neither according to nor 
contrary to Nature. 

"Accept everything which happens, even if it seems disagree- 
able, because it leads to the health of the universe and to pros- 
perity and felicity of Zeus," (the universe.) 

No poet of any day has sunk a sounding-line deeper than 
Wordsworth into the fathomless secret of suffering, that is in 
no sense retributive. He wrote: 

Suffering is permanent, obscure, and dark, 

And hath the nature of infinity. 

Yet through that darkness (infinite though 

It seems and unremovable) gracious openings lie, 

By which the soul — with patient steps of thought, 

Now toiling, wafted now on wings of prayer — 

May pass in hope, and, though from mortal bonds 

Yet undelivered, rise with sure ascent 

Even to the fountain-head of peace divine. 

Pain: the "Martyrdom of Man" is the Savior. It is also the 
real presupposition back of all the stages of martyrdom by which 
we reach the Great Mother. In her we find, we do not lose our 
existence. She is not a lion's den in which all our footsteps ter- 
minate and from which none are seen to emerge. Self-realiza- 
tion through self-sacrifice is the true philosophy. We die to live ; 
we live to die. "Our souls are restless till they rest in Thee," 
says St. Augustine. "He that loseth his life shall find it," is the 
refrain of many sayings in the New Testament. We live, suffer, 

* Meditations IV, 39. 
9 



120 THE GREAT MOTHER 

and die, that we self-evolving souls, after having traversed all the 
spheres of matter and mind, may attain the full knowledge of the 
God-head. That is the philosophy of pain. All other pain is 
but a cry from selfishness, containing no regenerating power. 
Pain is thus the stern daughter of the voice of the Great Mother. 

"There is no sunshine that hath not its shade, 
No shadow that the sunshine hath not made." 

Pain was born in the form of a man — a God-Man. The "Man 
of Sorrows" became a Savior, a living symbol of the trinity : gen- 
eration, death, regeneration. 

And now to come back to the quotation of Lafcadio Hearn: 
— we eat "the dust of our race, — the substance of our ancient 
selves." Here is the mystery : we are not eating "otherness," we 
eat ourselves ! ! 

Death and the Great Mother* 

Among the moderns, Leibnitz has the honor of being the first 
to advocate a complete and satisfactory view of Death. In his 
famous letter to Arnauld, he unfolded his theory. Leibnitz be- 
lieved that generation is only the development and evolution of an 
animal already existing in form, and that Death is only the re- 
envelopment or involution of the same animal, which does not 
cease to subsist but continues to live. The sum of vital energies 
does not vary in the world ; generation and Death are but changes 
in the order and adjustment of the principles of vitality — simple 
transformations from great to small and from small to great. 
Elsewhere he describes Death as no sudden phenomenon, and 
shows it to be a slow operation, a "Retrogradation." When we dis- 
cover Death it has long been master, for from the moment life 
began in the body it had corrupted fluids, disorganized tissues, 
destroyed equipoise, and endangered harmony. 

The views of Leibnitz had to wait long for general acceptance, 
but now they are recognized by all scientific students. And what 
do these ideas prove, but that Death is a natural form of exist- 
ence for the Great Mother? Death is the most practical and 
emphatic demonstration we know of, that everything is moving 



* Compare my article in Metaphysical Magazine, April, 1896. 



the; great mother 121 

and transmuted into something else. And this is one of the 
laws of the Great Mother. 

Of the eternal transmutation of the Great Mother we find 
a beautiful symbol in Greek mythology. Proteus could assume 
any form at pleasure, changing himself into fire or water, plant 
or animal. He was thus difficult of access and often an ap- 
proach was made impossible by a sudden transformation. No 
wonder, therefore, that Proteus has been understood to be sym- 
bolical of the various forms and shapes which "primitive" matter, 
(the Great Mother) assumes, the substance itself ever remain- 
ing the same. 

St. Augustine makes Proteus the emblem of truth but R. S. 
Foster (in "Christian Purity") says: "Error is a Proteus, ever 
assuming new forms and attacking truth under fresh disguises." 
Plato made Proteus an emblem of the Sophists, Cassiodorus of 
traitors, Lucian of players, etc., which shows the deep philosoph- 
ical import of the myth and the versatility of the heart ; in other 
words, the ever-changeable character of the Great Mother. Death 
is such a Proteus. Death is an event, not an entity; a state, 
not a force; a negation, nothing positive. Turn which way we 
will, we find no "killing principle" in Nature, only a vitalizing 
and sustaining one. Throughout the whole extent, Nature is 
life; in all forms and modifications, one vast and infinite life, 
subject no doubt to the extinction of particular phenomena, but 
never to absolute and total Death, even in its weakest and least 
of things. Anything that looks like Death is a token and certifi- 
cate of life being about to start anew. Death and life are but 
the struggle of life itself to attain a higher form. 

The ancients, who on the whole were wiser than we, realized 
this fully. Thus we find that they never raised an altar to Life, 
but personified Death. Life, a continuous process, can 
not be conceived as an individual, because it is too multi- 
form, too multifarious. Death, on the other hand, is a simple 
event, which we expect and can form an image of. Death, in 
the landscape and in human existence, for instance, assumes a 
certain melancholy air. A peculiar sadness — having its root in 
human egotism — falls upon the landscape in autumn, when the 
leaves "turn." The leaves, having performed their functions 



V 



122 THE GREAT MOTHER 

when the fruit has ripened, lose their brilliant green tint, wither, 
and fall, more or less deformed, to the ground. There the wind 
blows them hither and thither. They have served their use and 
seem to be thrown away as useless. At least so it seems to the 
ordinary onlooker and selfish man. Therefore he is sad. A 
more careful look, however, soon reveals the plastic work of 
the Great Mother. The leaves which fall to the ground at the 
foot of the trees, perish slowly upon the soil and are transformed 
into humus, or vegetable mold, indispensible to vegetable life. 
The debris of leaves becomes the bearers of the new forms 
of life. Death becomes Life. Even the frightful and dismal 
descriptions of the ancient poets, where they allude to Death, 
are correct descriptions of the Great Mother in the form of 
Necessity. They describe Death as thundering at the doors of 
mortals demanding the debt they owe, and sometimes as pursu- 
ing its prey, encompassing it on all sides with toils and snares. 
"Eternal Nature" has done the same to the "eternal rocks." 
What are they but the tombstones in the great graveyard of the 
world? All "the dust we tread upon was once alive." Death is 
but a form of the Great Mother in the shape of the mysterious 
balance, "which keeps the keys of all the creeds." 

The Greeks sometimes depicted Death and Sleep as twin boys, 
and it is a common phrase among us to say that Death is but 
Sleep. Fouche caused this inscription to be placed on all French 
cemeteries : "Death is an eternal Sleep." Thoughts of this kind 
are fast taking possession of the modern human mind. Great 
are the changes that have followed upon the medieval notions, 
that physical death was caused by Adam's sin. Most people will 
now express themselves in the words of Longfellow: 

There is no Death ! What seems so is transition ; 

This life of mortal breath 
Is but a suburb of the Elysian 

Whose portal we call Death. 



Or, in similar words of J. L. McCreery, in a poem wrongly 
attributed to Bulwer : 



THE GREAT MOTHER 123 

There is no death! the stars go down 
To rise upon some fairer shore; 

And bright in heaven's jewelled crown 
They shine for evermore. 

* 
The reason for this happy change is an understanding of the 
larger life of the Mother, which now has taken possession of man. 

In sleep we are restored. The world "goes to rest," as Plato 
says in the Protagoras, and is again "resurrected." What does 
Nature do with dirt, but to part and redistribute it? What does 
Spirit do with Evil, so-called, but to neutralize it? All antag- 
onisms are thrown into the eternal fire of the Great Mother's 
love, smelted and readjusted. She is thus the "lamb of God, 
that bearest the sins of the world." 

We must look among the world's great solitary men and 
women when we want to hear the words that glorify Death. 
Foremost among these is Leopardi. In his fine poem, "Love 
and Death," he called them "the two sweet lords, friends to the 
human race, whom fate gave being together," and addressed 
Death as "lovely death." 

Let us hail the coming of Death with the same joy as the 
Norse hero did when he felt the touch of the lance of the 
Valkyrie. Death is one of the Great Mother's beautiful hands. 
By means of Death she makes room for fresh generations and 
keeps the perennial banquet of life open to all. The early 
Christian fathers reasoned correctly when they rejoiced in the 
fall of Adam. If Adam had not sinned, he would not have, 
been driven out of Paradise, and no men would have been born 
— nor any Savior! 

The legend of the Wandering Jew is a wonderful imaginative 
picture of what would happen if we did not die, but were to 
live on continuously under present conditions. Ahasuerus is 
utterly wretched. Poor Tithonos is another illustration. Eos 
carried him off and begged immortality for him from the gods, 
but she forgot to add a request for eternal youth. While she 
herself remained a youthful maiden, Tithonos grew weak and 
withered. When he was tired of life, the gods out of pity 
changed him into a grasshopper. The fair young witch of 



124 TH E GREAT MOTHER 

Cumae suffered fearfully because Apollo granted her request 
for as many years as she held grains of dust in her hand. 

Only while we live, we fear Death. Death itself is nothing. 
Says Feuerbach : "Only before Death, but not in Death, is Death 
Death. Death is so unreal a being that he only is when he is 
not, and is not when he is." 

It is the frightened sensualist who says, with Ecclesiasticus : 
"O Death ! how bitter is the thought of thee to a man that liveth 
at rest in his possessions; unto the man that hath nothing to 
vex him, and hath prosperity in all things!" This view is not 
Christian, nor even pagan. It might be called the view of the 
beast. It knows not what it is "to be." 

We talk about the moral uses of dark things. What is the use 
of the dismal condition called Hell, Hades? Hela's kingdom is 
described in so vivid colors that Death itself seems to become 
alive. She rules over nine worlds in Niflheim, viz., the home of 
fog, mist (shadow). Niflheim is as good as Mannaheim and 
Jotunheim, the homes of man and giants (superior beings). 
Gloomy rivers flow through her world. One of these streams is 
called Slid and is full of mud and swords. In "Letters from 
Hell" a similar river is described, and both clearly show the use 
of dark things. Horrible is the coming of Hel, for she binds the 
dying man with strong chains that cannot be broken. Anguish 
gnaws his heart and Hela's maids invite him to their benches. 
Can spiritual death (conflict with the law and order) be de- 
picted any stronger? How strong is not Death! 

The deep philosophy of Hela and her relations to the Mother 
can be seen very readily when we learn that man's being, ac- 
cording to Norse notions, was divided between Odin and Hela. 
The hero desired the company of Odin, the Mother, in the form 
of fortune and glory. The coward — physical and moral — went 
to the other extreme of existence, to Hela. But these two forms 
are not eternal. Hela and Odin shall both ultimately be regen- 
erated in Ragnarok. While they rule they are the potencies of 
life. That is their use. No Hela, no Heaven. No Heaven, no 
Hela. The world exists only by virtue of the opposites. It is 
so the Great Mother's will. 

Some years ago, Woods Hutchinson, in one of our popular 



THE GREAT MOTHER 1 25 

magazines, wrote eloquently on "Death as a factor in Progress," 
and endeavored with much success to remove the unjust stigma 
set upon Death on account of misconceptions and misrepresen- 
tations. His arguments were those of modern religion and 
science : We see the crystal rocks crumble into a shapeless mass 
of dull, damp, colorless, lifeless clay. Here, indeed, to all ap- 
pearances, is the desolation of death in all its hopeless repulsive- 
ness. But wait a moment ; here comes a tiny descendant of some 
crystal, which has stumbled upon the faculty of dying and im- 
proved thereon unto the fifty thousandth generation — a lichen 
spore, drifting along the surface of the clay. Filmy rootlets 
run downward; tiny buds shoot upward; a new life has begun. 

The lichen is green and beautiful, but as an individual it can 
rise no higher. Here again progress is barred and Death must 
be called to its aid. The lichen dies and its dust returns to the 
earth, carrying with it the spoils of the sunlight, air, and dew, to 
enrich the seed-bed. A hundred or more generations follow in 
the same way. As the poet sings, the crystals have risen "on 
stepping-stones of their dead selves to nobler things," and of 
any link in the chain may be said, in the words of Inspiration: 
"Except it die it abideth alone." 

Death is progress. How much does not progress owe to coal? 
Once it was a living forest, but worthless, for it supported not 
the tiniest life ; dead, it is a life-giver, a founder of civilizations. 

But what is the use of being born only to die? Why does 
Nature waste so much life? Nothing is really lost. Wanton 
destruction is only apparent. Nature is no waster ; the Mother is 
a great economist. Death is economy. Many of our efforts seem 
useless ; the smallest number of seed products is used for propa- 
gation, but who says they were made for that purpose only? 
Has not the effort been a means of growth ? The seeds die to 
produce life — life of a higher order. 

Let us make use of Death, active use! Let Death enter our 
economy of life as an educator, and be as welcome as his twin 
brother, Sleep! Death is Life! Life is Death! 

Life and Death as a Process 

I speak now of Life, not as a biological fact, but as a transit, 
a transiency, a process, and thus understood it may just as well 



126 THE GREAT MOTHER 

be called Death, because it is a mere negative. It will shock 
many to hear such a statement, because it is so unusual, but that 
does not change the fact that Life as a process may just as well 
be called Death or change. For this is a fact that we can not 
seize its beginning or end; we can not measure the length of its 
line or its arithmetical proportions. Neither time nor space en- 
close it nor does it give existence to time or space in any real 
way. These are only passing factors and we mistake the passage 
for a reality. 

One is the life of an oak, another that of a butterfly and a 
prophet and my beloved — but what is the distinction? They all 
terminate in Death or hasten in the direction man calls Death. 
Does that not prove that their Life is in the same category? 
Their attitude differs, but their law is the same: none of them 
are masters of Life, they obey Kali, the Mother. 

Life is a mockery. Its truth is Death or the passing out. It 
does not even seek its own. It arms one animal against another, 
but has prepared that other for destruction of the first. Life is 
thus a self-contradiction or must have another purpose than that 
which we call Life. — 

This glorification of Death finds its advocates and teachers 
among Nature-Mystics. And it is necessary that the world at 
large should accept it. It is the way to the "Unitive Way" or the 
Path. There can be no progress in spirituality before we make 
friends with Death. 

With this doctrine I terminate the first part of my book : The 
Nature-Mystery of the Great Mother. 



II 

THE BEAUTY AND ART MYSTERY 

OF 

THE GREAT MOTHER 

Standing before Beauty, "I cast my eyes down before it, as did those to whom the 
Highest appeared, believing I see the Highest in these visions." — Winckelmann. 



Let Beauty be our Yoga. Beauty is the interpreter and mediator of life's opposites. 



128 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Art and the Great Mother 



The bee and the worm excel man in diligence and mechanical 
craft; the Seraph in knowledge, but Art is man's alone. Art 
is the human interpretation of the work of the Great Mother, 
and is wonderful if it really makes clear, translates, expounds, 
unfolds, unravels and explains her. The chasm between Self 
and Not-Self, between Man and Nature, between the Conscious 
and the Unconscious, is done away with by Art, if it bridges 
the gulf and conducts us from the vestibule of knowledge, as 
it were, to the shrine. The Great Mother reveals herself to the 
artist in the creative moods, and thus Art, ' which to the artist 
is higher than philosophy, is a sort of rending of the veil of 
Nature, or the opening of a door into her secrets. It is by 
aesthetic insight that we reach the transcendental as an ob- 
jective reality. 

From this point of view we can see the justification and value 
of Schiller's "Aesthetic Education of Man," and all efforts in 
that direction. Where a nobler idea than this of his? "In the 
physical state man endures the power of Nature ; In the aesthet- 
ic state he frees himself from it; In the moral state he controls 
it." 

It will not be disputed that the true aim of life is self-real- 
ization. Nor can it be disputed that one of the most important 
elements in promoting self-realization is power, energy, or the 
Great Mother of whom I speak. 

Another most important element in the process of self-realiza- 
tion is clearness of conception, a vivid understanding of the 
purpose or the craft of the Great Mother's Workmaster. It is 
a fact that the same two ideas: power and clearness, are fun- 
damental both in the Inner-Life and in Art. It will therefore 
be most interesting to examine the relationship of the Inner- 
Life and Art. But the very moment we compare the Inner- 
Life and Art a difficulty presents itself, because religion comes 
and asserts that it is the greatest power on earth. And we all 
know how the adherents of creeds will fight, especially if they are 
weak in character, because creed gives them an external founda- 



the; great mother 129 

tion which they in their weakness and blindness substitute for 
religion. 

In opposition to creeds it is declared by Plato that Beauty is 
the strongest power. In the Symposium he maintains that when 
religions, righteousness and all other powers which men hold 
in respect, fail to find an entrance to the soul, Art still has 
avenues by which it can reach the soul. And I maintain that 
the Great Mother is the mystery of all Art and craft. 

As weak souls defend creeds as the greatest power on earth; 
so, on the other hand, strong and individualistic souls defend 
Plato's theory and statement and they do it because they rest 
in themselves and act from out themselves and the Great Mother. 
There is no contradiction between religion and Plato. The two 
\notions are opposites, they are polarities in the soul's existence 
and no more. Neither of them cares for creeds. 

I assert that the Inner-Life and the Beauty-Life correspond 
to each other in such a way that they may be respectively Inner 
and Outer of each other, viz., in one moment I may say that 
Beauty-Life is the outer expression of the Inner-Life; in the 
next, I may say that the Inner-Life is merely the spiritual side 
of Beauty-Life, which is the real life. And this is possible be- 
cause both represent the Great Mother. 

If it should be desirable to use the terms Mysticism and Art, 
rather than Inner-Life and Beauty, then there is no objection 
and the case stands as before. The only difference is that 
Mysticism then should be called the earth-form of the Inner- 
Life and the Art the earth-form of Beauty. And these distinc- 
tions are desirable anyway and at all times. By Mysticism I 
understand a life directed towards the transcendental; a life 
not only free from illusions, but a life which has made its 
devotees living channels of themselves and filled them with the 
Universal. And I speak of Art as heaven-born and not as an 
industry, and about artists as banner bearers of the ideal and 
not as tradesmen. If these two terms, Mysticism and Art, are 
used, then we may say in one moment that Art is the outer to 
Mysticism and in the next we may declare that Mysticism is 
an outer form of Art. 

My readers are not far off, if they call the Mystic a priest of 



I30 THE GREAT MOTHER 

the valley, the valley of life; and if they call the artist, the 
priest of the mountain, the mount of transfiguration. The 
reason for these correspondences lies in the fact that Mysticism 
and Art are functions of the human spirit in which it seeks 
company with the ideal and speaks familiarly with the Great 
Mother about the perfect lines of spirals, waves and curves by 
which she creates charm and reveals herself. Another reason 
for these correspondences is this, that the common source of 
Mysticism and Art is found in spiritual freedom. Spiritual 
freedom is the hallmark of all Mysticism and Art. 

But if this reasoning is not satisfactory then I offer another. 
I will say that the reconciliation of Inner-Life and Art is found 
in our passional life. 

I said passional life. I do not speak about our passions, the 
burning flames that destroy. I speak in the language of John 
of the Cross, of a fire that "burns to heal." I speak of the fire 
that burned on the mountains in some of the ancient mysteries 
and which was said to have fallen from heaven. The passi onal 
life, I speak of is that intensity which colors the rose and tb^ 
lily; which flashes upon the human eye when it stares at a 
star; which fashions a maiden's breast and which glows in the 
devotee's prayer. I speak of an intensity which in the Mysteries 
is called the sacred fire and the Great Mother's Presence. Some 
old records tell us that once it was seen as flames upon apostolic 
foreheads. 

In such passional life Saint Teresa meets the artist Michael 
Angelo. It — and it alone can draw chaste lines like those on the 
columns of the Parthenon. Such passional life is mystic and 
it is artistic. It is its own reason for being. It identifies good- 
ness with beauty. It has in it the power of balance and harmony, 
whether expressed in music or in a line. By it, the good man 
becomes Beauty realized in flesh and blood and it carves the 
Milesian Aphrodite in stone. All in the Mother's power! 

When the mystic soul calls for the embrace of the heavenly 
spouse, it is impelled by the same energy which can draw the 
so-called "line of beauty." In the Mystic it is spiritual energy 
humanized; in the case of the artist it is energy animated with 
thought or rather the natural world sublimated in the alembic 



the; great mother 131 

of the artist's mind. Phidias in Athens and Angela in Florence 
both burned with the same spirit and interpreted life by it. To 
the Greek, Art was religion. To the Mystic, religion is an 
aesthetic intuition. Phidias saw beauty and expressed it in 
lines. Angela lived beauty and put it into ecstatic expressions 
and lofty prayers. Apollo, Artemis, Hermes, Aphrodite were 
Greek beauty conceptions. The Messiah and the Logos were He- 
brew God-Man ideas. But, both the Greek and the Hebrew per- 
sonifications were human intensity transferred to eternal ideas; 
both were manifestations of the passional life, the power that 
reconciles the Inner-Life and Art; both were utterances of 
the Great Mother. 

The difference between the lines drawn by Rembrandt to in- 
dicate the horizon and the sky and similar ones attempted by the 
tyro is this, that Rembrandt's line is conscious and even eloquent ; 
that of the beginner is indistinct and confused, but both are 
moved by the same fire and purpose, borrowed from the Great 
Mother. Similarly, the difference between the "prayer of 
silence" of Molinos and that of a young initiate is this, that the 
mystic Molinos moves in a region of divine images, while the 
neophyte is limited to words of petition; nevertheless both 
breathe their request in passional terms, both are sublimated by 
fire and moved by the Mother. For short, the Mystic and the 
artist meet in the passional life as I have defined it. In the pas- 
sional life both earth forms, that of the Mystic and that of the 
artist melt away into a condition higher than themselves, one 
of Inner-Life and Beauty and these are as I said both above 
Mysticism and Art; they are direct appearances in the Great 
Mother. 

It may be objected that artists should seek truth, etc., etc. 
I do not object. In fact I agree. And there is no contradiction. 
Truth is the form of Passion. Passion shapes itself as truth. 
Look at Nature and you will see that there is only Truth where 
there is intensity, Passion. The weak stem does not bear bright 
and powerful leaves and never raises its head triumphantly to- 
wards heaven in rising and strong lines. 

Truth is the form and expression of that passional life which 
seeks the society of Mystics and vice versa, the Mystics ought to 



132 THE GREAT MOTHER 

seek artists. Had Mystics of the past done that they would have 
shown more sense than they did, and if artists of to-day would 
seek down to the wells whence all mystic life emanates, they 
would get a much needed inspiration. The relationship of Mys- 
ticism and Art being as I have defined it, it seems fit and proper 
that we should invite the disciples of the two phenomena to 
seek company. 

All Art seeks an ordered movement towards higher levels 
of reality and the true artist, like the real Mystic, seeks union 
with the Infinite, the Great Mother; both long for that tran- 
scendental feeling which is creative imagination ; both raise their 
eyes to catch glimpses of that plastic power which moulds, not 
only their own genius and work but which shows them the "se- 
cret plan" of the Master. It seems proper therefore that I direct 
the attention of artists to Mysticism, which always has cultivated 
that "life-enhancing power," which modern artists recognize as 
the supreme quality of good painting. And for a truth, unless 
the artist becomes a living channel of himself and of the 
Great Mother, he shall not be able to reveal any secrets. 

Thus far by way of introduction. The general preliminary 
ideas relating to the subject of the relationship of the Inner-Life 
and Art have now been set forth. They center in the Great 
Mother. I will next speak more in detail and first of all define 
what Art really is. And to that effect, I will at once state 
that the word Art primarily does not mean what we ordinarily 
understand by craft or craftsmanship or anything that partakes of 
artifice. The word describes something far more profound, some- 
thing which lies at the root of all culture and civilization. The 
word Art is derived from the Latin arare, to plow, to cultivate. 
The plowman is the true artist, so says Mother-Nature and his 
work is her Art, not merely an art. It is the proper human work 
and according to her heart. As the plow cuts up the soil to 
loosen it and to air it, so the plow, spiritually considered, is that 
radical power which stirs up the inertia of our being and makes 
growth possible. Throughout Nature and Humanity there is 
a plowing and a cultivating going on and the plowman executes 
the Mother's generative power, her creating and recreating ener- 
gy, upon which all life-features depend. His work is her work. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 133 

To Mystics this plowing and this Art is of much profounder 
interest than any other Art. And this definition of Art does not 
remove it from the sphere of the fine arts. By no means. Back 
of the plowing of the soil lies the Beautiful as much as it lies 
back of the painter's .and sculptor's art. 

The application of this interpretation of Art in relation to 
life on the Path, can only lift our conceptions to a higher 
plane. All life on the Path is certainly always a plowing and a 
sowing ; a carving of new creations, a designing of higher ideals ; 
a singing in tune with the eternal harmonies; yea, it is even a 
dance in the rhythmic swing of all the cosmic forces. 

We should not make a dualistic distinction between Art un- 
derstood cosmically and Art as it is known in the studios and 
galleries. Art in either or both places is not a separate or iso- 
lated life phenomenon. Art is an integral part of the fullness 
of life which meets us all, if we are the least awake to that 
which is going on around us. We can not be or become artists, 
in any sense of the word, if we are not in it with the full and 
undivided energy of spirit. Nor shall any of us understand Art, 
in any sense of the word, unless we serve it as a mediating 
power, or, which is the same, as a connecting link between the 
individual and the universal and as the Great Mother's handicraft. 

To understand Art as an integral part of the fullness of life 
and as a mediating power, it is necessary that we realize Art to 
be no mere mentality, but a manifestation of will or intensity.* 

To say that our Art must be a will expression in us, is of 
course something new. Nevertheless it is so. Art is will mani- 
festation and not a mentality. And the proof of the truth of my 
assertion is to be found in the fact that it is through the will 
that Art exerts its influence. Among professional artists it is 
considered a presumption for a non-professional to talk about 
Art. He is supposed to know nothing about it. As I am no 
professional I will state my standpoint and submit to profession- 
al criticism, if I must. My art education has been in the Open 
Nature. My enthusiasm has been fed from sources which have 



* When I speak of will, I must not be understood to be talking about volition, but 
about will as a special physiological expression of our human form, corresponding to the 
World Soul. I mean to say that that which is the World Soul in the Cosmos is supreme 
Will in us. 



134 TH E GREAT MOTHER 

their origin in the Inner-Life. I know it is not the common 
place where students go to learn about lines and colors. But 
I have never regretted my choice. But I have also studied and 
lived with some of the few real masterpieces of art. I have 
chosen the few and not the many for obvious reasons. My 
relation to Nature is religious, viz., I am a devotee, a worship- 
per. I doubt any saint has ever kissed his crucified Savior with 
more reverence than I, in my enthusiasm, kiss Mother Nature. 
My relation to the Inner-Life was started by the so-called 
Mystics, men and women, who live a life consecrated to the 
Sublime. Some were of the Orient, some are of the Occident; 
all are persons of superior qualities. What that Inner-Life is 
will appear as I proceed with the subject. I will only now say that 
the words applied to Hercules apply also to it: "Whether he 
stood, or walked, or sat, or whatever thing he did, he conquered." 
The Inner-Life is the conquering force in our existences. The 
Inner-Life is the Great Mother's Presence in us. 

I shall speak a great deal about Nature-Mysticism and will 
speak as a Nature-Mystic. 

The word Nature-Mysticism is new and as far as I know, 
coined by myself. But whether coined by me or not, is of but 
small consequence; it is a good and useful word. I will explain 
it. Mysticism, I call the earth-form or manifestation of the 
Inner-Life. And if I speak about Nature as a living individual, 
I may consistently speak about Nature's Inner-Life and call that 
manifestation mystic, and, when systematically presented, that 
manifestation is properly called Nature-Mysticism. This view 
of Nature is radically different from the common view of Nature 
which speaks of Nature as of neuter gender, calls Nature deaf, 
dumb and blind and unconscious and prattles about man being 
Nature's superior and master, and which says, that human art 
is an improvement upon Nature. To be a Nature-Mystic is to 
be an Inner-Life man or woman, who is in touch with Nature's 
Inner-Life as fully as with his or her own. 

Pere Lacordaire bid good-bye to the flowers and the streams 
and the seeds in order to retire to the Inner-Life. Tauler drew 
his cap down over his eyes that the flowers should not disturb 
his meditations. Both lived an Inner-Life of their own, but 



THE GREAT MOTHER 135 

they did not simultaneously live Nature's Inner-Life. They 
were not Nature-Mystics, but Mind-Mystics. As was the case 
with Lacordaire and Tauler, so it has been with most of the 
other Mystics. They have been even more pronounced subjective 
Inner-Life people. They have had nothing directly to offer to 
artists. For what can artists do without that tangible life which 
they see, feel and hear and call Nature? If I therefore recom- 
mend Mysticism to artists, it is principally Nature-Mysticism, 
I recommend. To artists I say: If it be possible, try to look 
upon your Art as Nature's efforts through you as a workman, 
rather than as your own efforts, and if your work is Mother- 
Nature's work, you will soon discover that so called impersonal 
Nature is not impersonal, but very personal and that Nature is 
an individual living an Inner-Life as truly as any Mystic. And 
if you, from the moment of discovery, let Nature take charge 
of you, your work will be richer in ideas and fuller in power; 
for short, it will reveal a splendor which is a new Art and by 
following this mystic method you have become a new artist. 

As my subject dev elopes my readers will see a temple of 
beauty arise. It will be built in a square, the true measure of 
man, and, the measure of that temple, built on foundations laid 
in the eternal order of the universe which can not be shaken; 
it reaches into the eternal arms of that genius which is the guid-. 
ing and plastic power of the universe, the Great Mother. One 
wall of the temple, I call Energy or Love or Fullness. The sec- 
ond wall is named Light, Line, Fire or Form. The third wall is 
Reconciliation and the fourth, is Harmony. 

To study the nature of Art most profitably we must for the 
moment forget the crafts, all the arts as such, and rise into the 
universal regions and there seek for fundamentals, for the funda- 
mental facts, for the creative energy, which is the moving factor 
in all that which we call Art : the Mother herself. 

As soon as we do that, we discover at once, that Art is not a 
result; not effect, but, that Art in its best sense is only another 
term for Energy, that deep movement which is the cause of the 
ever evolving life. 

It appears that art — and such is the verbal meaning of the 
word — is that radical power which plows up the inertia of being. 



I36 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Max Miiller, as said before, has told us that the word Art is 
our form of the Latin arare, to plow, to cultivate. 

To plow and cultivate the fields is Art, not an art, and it is 
human work proper. But in a higher sense, there is a plowing 
and a cultivating going on throughout Nature and humanity. 
There is a universal energy, call it the generative power, that 
creates and re-creates and that work is Art in the true sense of 
the word. When we speak of Art we must not speak about a 
product, about efforts, but about the cause and the organizing 
energy of the products popularity called Art. To speak that way 
will be to speak with an understanding of Art. And it is in that 
sense and from that point of view I constantly shall speak about 
Art. Back of Art, thus understood, lies the transcendental world 
we call the Beautiful, but that I am not speaking of at present. 

To my artist reader, I say: Descend into the quiet places of 
your souls and you shall see that it is so, or, watch the well- 
springs of your passions and you shall feel where your love for 
the vibrating graces of lines comes from, and, where the dwell- 
ing-place is of those colors, which put soul into your work. If your 
lines are truly living and your colors burn with fire, then they 
are produced by that Universal Energy which moves at the 
bottom of every one of us, "the ground of the soul" as the Mys- 
tics name it: the Great Mother. Look once again when you 
come home upon your pen and your brush and you will hereafter 
smile upon them and greet them as types of Art and Inner-Life. 
The lines of beauty that you from now on shall draw and the 
colors that shall lighten with superabundant life, will be offerings 
to the Unknown God residing within you : the Great Mother and 
her Workmaster. 

All this is not merely phraseology! I want you to take my 
words as coming from that Inner-Life, I have referred to. I 
am speaking in the name of the Inner-Life and for the Great 
Mother ! 

It has been customary to associate Art with the senses and to 
say that Art addresses the human sensuous nature. It is a com- 
mon statement that Art is the revelation of truth in sensuous 
form. Such for instance is the aesthetic theory of the German 
philosopher Frederich Hegel and perhaps that theory has be- 
come a philosophy of the Beautiful to some. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 137 

It is also common talk that Art is the Beautiful reflected 
through a human temperament. I deny totally the truth of these 
and other equally common doctrines, and I will have nothing 
to do with them. None of them explain Art and all of them 
rest upon a false philosophy. They rest upon a dualistic phil- 
osophy and all dualism confuses. 

No dualism can satisfy the human soul and does not express 
the fundamental psychological facts upon which all our mental, 
moral and Art development depend. Instead of the false and un- 
satisfactory theories, I will place forms of the Inner-Ijfe which 
I claim will lift the Art conceptions to a high level and make Art 
a reconciliation to life and a satisfactory explanation of many 
mysteries otherwise not mediated and therefore left as disturbing 
elements in philosophy and in life. I want to do away with the 
notion which splits man into two, a higher and a lower, spirit and 
sense. I will not allow the word sensuous to have any essential 
value. I will let it have a relative value for the sake of our de- 
fective language. But no more. Man is a monos, not a bundle 
of faculties. Man is neither double, triple or quadruple nor any 
other multiple figure. Man appears in moments under some one 
of these forms, but he only appears so, he is not a chaos. It is 
necessary to understand this fully, in order to appreciate what 
I shall say about Art as one of the ways in which man may re- 
veal himself and the resident glory of the Great Mother. 

I will emphasize very strongly an aspect of Art too often for- 
gotten or ignored. And it is this, that Art is not a separate or 
isolated life phenomenon. It is an integral part of the fullness 
of the Mother's life which meets us all, if we are the least awake 
to what is going on around us. We can not be or become artists 
if we are not in it with the full and individual energy of soul and 
spirit. Nor shall any of us understand the Great Mother by Art 
unless we revere it as a mediating power. Art is not a separate 
phenomenon, but is the force of beauty and craves a devotion 
equal to love. And the reason for this is that Art and beauty 
are not mentalities but two terms for one power, one activity. 

The way to approach Art is not by means of mind but by 
means of will, as said before, by means of that will in us which 
makes our human form and is the psychological expression of 
the World Soul. 



I38 THE GREAT MOTHER 

This, of course, is something new and may not meet with ready 
acceptance. Nevertheless this is the truth of Art and realized by 
those who know the Mother. Art is a will manifestation and 
not mere intelligence. And it is through the will that Art exerts 
it's influence. While this may not have been stated in so few 
words in any of the past aesthetics, the history of art in its re- 
lation to the past culture proves it. For instance: — Spartan life 
was expressed in rigid forms, with strength and energy as ends 
in themselves. Doric columns had the simplicity of Spartan life. 
It was Spartan will-energy expressed and appealed to, and the 
appeal succeeded because the Doric race was cast in that mould 
and could only be influenced by will, and it was influenced by Art 
of a will-character. 

The new Art, the coming Art, under influence of the Inner- 
Life and Nature-Mysticism will influence humanity in a similar 
way. Martial music always stirs and quickens because it agi- 
tates the heart and mind and it is only martial music because it 
agitates the heart and mind. Agitation is will-energy and will- 
energy is the core of life. Aside from mechanical or mathematical 
music, only that music affects us which in its intonations impells 
our emotions. That clearly shows the relationship to the great 
active power that moves our existence. Analogous to the will- 
effect of music is harmony in painting when color is a vehicle 
for expression. It is not the drawing, but the color that gives 
the value or power which affects. Take Rubens as an illustra- 
tion. His well known and much criticized painting "The Erection 
of the Cross." Those who do not understand that a painting means 
power made visible can not understand the brilliancy of that 
painting. To them that painting should be a horrible death 
scene. To Rubens it was and meant to be an apotheosis of 
man, and Rubens rightly understood and expressed himself. 
His painting is power or Art as I define Art. 

The German government has correctly understood the power 
of Art. It therefore utilizes it as a means for the development of 
the public spirit in the land. It erects and encourages the erection 
of monuments everywhere to the honor of national heroes. The 
monuments are not merely for adornment, they are power for- 
mulations and the traveler in Germany can not escape the influ- 
ence of the Mysticism in Art thus revealed. The spirit of the 



the; great mother 139 

Teutonic life is revealed as much by these modern monuments 
as by the old castles. 

Why is it that Japanese handicraft exerts such a fascination? 
It is simply because the Japanese workman has put his own 
personal power into his work. Japanese art is truly a human 
manifestation; it is vastly more than handicraft. It is the Great 
Mother humanized. The workman has given way to that vital 
urge which wished to manifest itself in him, and there are num- 
erous records extant to prove that the Japanese artist would 
rather starve and sacrifice his life than fail to express the full 
measure of the power that urged him. That attitude is Mysti- 
cism in Art. We know that Japanese workmen prepare them- 
selves religiously for an influx of art-energy, that their work 
may truly be a birth from above. 

By these illustrations I have endeavored to show what I mean 
by saying that Art is Energy, is a power-manifestation, an urge, 
an impulse, a Presence of the Great Mother and not something 
else. I have also endeavored to illustrate that Art is no separate 
phenomenon, but a complete power in itself. 

I mean to claim that Art is life and a wholeness and not a 
part. I claim this because if that can be understood, then it will 
also be understood why I claim it as an expression identical to 
the Mystic or Inner-Life. Again, my illustrations also prove 
what I assert, namely that Nature and Art are not two domains, 
but identical in spirit. Art is neither the counterfeit nor the 
counterpart of Nature. But Nature rightly understood is su- 
preme Art, and, Art rightly understood is the warm and full 
Nature, and, both views are mystical. Both Nature and Art 
are united in that mystical world we call Beauty. Beauty is 
stronger than both goodness and truth, because its domain is 
larger. Beauty is the form of love and love is the substance 
of Beauty and both are the hands of the Great Mother. By 
those hands love is dispensed and by the same hands the Great 
Mother paints, moulds and makes music. I have defined Art 
as identical with energy and done it in entire harmony with the 
New Life manifest among us. 

I will now define Art by using another term. I will use the 
term love for identification, and first define Love. Love is not 



I40 THE GREAT MOTHER 

a personifying passion nor the rhythm of generation. There is 
nothing in it of a consuming fire nor does it stifle the spiritual 
breath. It does not unnerve the limbs nor dissolve reason. 
Love is a new existence and neither an emotion nor an abstrac- 
tion. It is a real power ; it is the eternal life actualized. By Love 
we sing sublimely, and our hand blesses all things. It has senses 
of its own ; reasons of its own. It finds affinities where they truly 
are. Love is not a far off idea ; it is the impulse and direction of 
the world and all things obey gladly. Love is not a separate 
grace or gift for the elect only. Nay, the moth that flies into 
the flame and perishes and the hero are both actuated by Love 
and obey its behest. Love is a magic agent. Hear a story. 
Hortense Schneider, a well known Parisian actress years ago, 
used to eat real cherries on the stage even though they were out 
of season. Every evening she would toss a cherry stone to the 
audience and any of her admirers who caught the stone kept it 
as a precious memorial. One of these gentlemen planted the 
cherry stone in his garden and some years after he was able to 
send her a basket of cherries from the tree that grew from that 
stone. Examine this tale. The cherry stone is outside the 
actions of the actress and her admirer. The point of the story 
lies in the doings of hers and his. Hers were no doubt frivo- 
lous, his was like a Parisian bon mot. But Nature or Universal 
Love which is ever near and ready to transmute the lower into 
the higher showed her magic. Nature proved that Love is both 
earthly and heavenly; that Love is as Plato told us "an inter- 
preter between God and man," and as Paul told us so strong 
that "neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor 
things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor 
depth, nor any other creation, shall be able to separate us from 
the love of God." (Rom. viii, 38-39.) 

Nothing superior has been said about Love than that said by 
Platonism. It is ideal Love we hear about and nothing else. A 
new consciousness was born. The Jewish Messiah, as Greek 
consciousness conceived him, was born in Platonism and we know 
now how to love and to live. In Love and Life we have "the in- 
terpreter and mediator" between God and man. Not a mere ab- 
straction or emotion but a reality, was born by the Greek con- 
sciousness. Love is now, since Plato, in the world and revealed 



THE GREAT MOTHER 141 

to all who wish to partake in the feast. Let us therefore more 
and more make Love a reality. We shall then also know more and 
grow in wisdom. If we do this then the new Art, which many 
so ardently long for, shall come. 

I am fortunate in having illustrations to choose from, which, 
not only as subjects but also in the manner they have been re- 
lated, lend themselves admirably to my purpose. My illustra- 
tions are all of Aphrodite, the Love and Beauty goddess. 

But let it be understood at once that I am speaking of Aphro- 
dite in a peculiar way. She is one of Greece's many conceptions 
of the Great Mother. 

Late, very late, in Greek history, when philosophers discerned 
the truth and poets lived pure lives, Aphrodite Urania was born, 
and since then, she still rules men who have self-respect and 
women who are worthy of their glorious name as being repre- 
sentative of her, whom all ancient religions called Magna Mater. 

Aphrodite Urania is Beauty and it is therefore that she is the 
true and highest form possible of love. It is Beauty which tames 
man. To be sure, she could not tame the gods of Olympia, but 
does tame man, nevertheless. Greece revelled in her revelation. 
She sang about her Aphrodite on the lips of all her poets, great 
and small, and her sculptors cut her form in marble, and we have 
heard the song and seen the statue. Aphrodite Urania has Mes- 
sianic powers. She is the power of the chaste lines in the 
columns of the Parthenon. She is the inner life of the Ionic 
capital, and she is the melodious expansion of the curves of the 
honeysuckle such as the Greek soul modified that wild and most 
elastic of all plants. In this she is the Inner-Life as the Greek 
understood it and expressed it in his art. In our own day she is 
still more. 

Greece has also told the everlasting story of Helen. Greece 
has whispered about Sappho; sent Aspacia to Pericles and 
profited by it. Phryne at one time was the main attraction at 
the Eleusinian mysteries. At Plato's Banquet sat Socrates. It 
was he who said that "man was the measure of things," and who 
declared, "I know but one little thing. It is Love." Well may we 
put these two famous sayings together and now say "Love is the 
measure of all things," and man the bearer of both. And that 
was what the Platonic dialogue meant, when it was declared that 



142 THE GREAT MOTHER 

"Love is the interpreter and mediator." When Socrates said that, 
then was Art born in Greek consciousness. Then the Inner-Life 
burst forth in flames. Art up to that time had been stammering. 
Now it spoke in clear language. We ask for no more or better 
definition of Love and Art. None can be given and none has been 
given. It is Greece's everlasting glory to have said the word of 
freedom, that Love and Art are the interpreters and mediators. 
With Love and Art as interpreters and mediators between God 
and man, we may lay the measuring rod up to the affair between 
Abellard and Heloise. We may judge Troubadours and Min- 
nesingers of all kinds, and all forms of romantic love, forms 
which are all of late origin, all results of evolution and all post- 
Christian. With Love and Art as interpreters we shall never be 
at a loss to put the right value upon any drama we may see on 
the stage or in life. We shall not be in doubt about Love songs 
heard from such men as Catullus, Propertius, Tibullus; nor 
about books like Horace's "Art of Love," nor about erotic out- 
bursts from Faust, Henrich Heine, Swinburne, Rosetti, Dante, 
Michael Angelo, on from the innumerable fools of all ages, who 
rush in where angels fear to tread. With the same marvelous 
key we can unlock Feminism of the Italian republics, the Court 
Cabales of France, the Love courts of the Middle Ages and the 
maze of Chivalry. — Coming down to our own day the question 
naturally arises : are Love and Art still the interpreters and medi- 
ators between God and Man ? That question can not be answered 
at once. We must first answer the question : Is there still Love 
in the world? You know, many people think Love has fled, be- 
cause in many places it is thought that Love is too sentimental an 
affair for the modern man; in some places Love is only a con- 
venient housekeeper; in other places Love is but dalliance, in 
others, coquetry, gallantry or jealousy, tyranny, abhorrence, 
lust or a Bluebeard. Nowhere a redeemer ? No doubt, Love has 
fled from these places — the world, however, is everlastingly 
young! The Greeks truly thought of Love as a young boy, 
Cupid. In view of the fact, that the world is always young, 
sometimes wise, sometimes foolish and always needing an answer 
to its longings, I may well say : yes ! Love is still here and now 
as always "the interpreter and mediator" if called upon. It is 
probably true what Tennyson said : " 'Tis better to have loved 



the great mother 143 

and lost than never to have loved at all." This in spite of Mon- 
taigne : "it is hard for a man to be in Love and in his senses at the 
same time." Tennyson sang of Love. Montaigne talked about 
lust. Let those talk who want to talk; Love will love and con- 
tinue to change the foce of the earth, because it is the personal 
factor in history. It is Love and lust that transform laws and 
religions; they construct and they destroy every and all human 
institutions. Love and lust are the forces that make the world 
go round and renew it. They are the Great Mother's tools. 

My illustrations upon Love and Inner-Life were historical in 
character. I will now give some, more specially, from art works. 
I shall continue as before to speak of the works of art as values 
rather than as technical productions. I approach them as a lover, 
not as an art critic. They are to me stages in the Inner-Life and 
not objects catalogued in museums. 

In Greek Art we meet the Aphrodite found on Melos. She is 
the victory of physical beauty reinforced by the charms of mind 
and soul. She is not the Venus chosen by Paris, the cow boy, 
She is not vulgar. She is Venus Urania, the heavenly Venus. 
She has grander lines than the ordinary Greek Aphrodite and 
her figure is more commanding, her face nobler: characteristics 
fit for personifications of Love in transcendental aspects : the 
Great Mother. We do not know who modelled her, but certainly 
Praxiteles did not. She has none of his delirious sensuality. 
Though full of warmth she is the very light of the summer 
morning. In candle light it is not the wax, the taper, the black 
burning core or the yellow light which these give, that is most 
characteristic; it is the white light and the diffused light which 
are important. The lines of the Milesian Aphrodite glow with 
lights in masterful gradations of tone. They throw off that 
white light, which in the candle enables us to see the world and 
causes us to wonder about the light itself and the transcendental 
world to which it belongs. Her lines hold no bewildering sen- 
suality, but translate us beyond ourselves. It is the white and 
diffused light which everywhere in Art strikes us at once and 
always interprets truly the value of that which is before us. It 
is that light which also reveals the daemonic in the Aphrodite of 
Melos to those who have stood before her statue in the Louvre 



144 TH 3 GREAT MOTHER 

or who have gazed worshipful on a living model and filled with 
that holy reverence, Se«nSai/i.ovia, the Greeks spoke of. 

I wish I dared enlarge my description of this figure. But 1 
dare not; only in the language of Homer and Sophocles can this 
queenly Aphrodite be described. It requires a religious ecstacy to 
understand those perfect forms and a prophetic genius to divine 
the secret thoughts of that face more mysterious than the Sphinx. 
She is in many senses the Venus Victrix whose name Caesar 
gave his soldiers as watchword on the evening before the battle 
at Pharsalus in which he crushed his rival Pompei and became 
master of Rome. 

Praxiteles' Aphrodite, for which Phryne is supposed to have 
stood model, is refined and noble sensuality, and an admirable 
type of an all around personality, and typical of one form of 
Love of much value. She too, is a type of the Inner-Life and 
carved by the same enthusiasm as the Milesian, but lacks the 
severe discipline of form. She is full of graceful curves and 
attractions, but no man would worship her with that holy rever- 
ence which in Greece is called daisidaimonia. She is, however, 
the Inner-Life, such as it may be seen in elastic and undulating 
plants. The Medicean Venus is a coquette and "love for sale" 
and not of qualitative value and not a type of the Inner-Life or 
the Great Mother. 

Love and Art in the Renaissance period is represented by 
Madonnas, angels and saints ; by piety and religious ardor, loves 
of another order than the Greek. It is Love and Art neither 
vulgar, nor domestic; it is emaciated spirituality, a sorrowful 
example upon what ascetic ideas can do when they enter the 
world of Love and Art. There is no Inner-Life in it. 

Titian's two loves, "Sacred and Profane Love" must be men- 
tioned. The one to the left of the spectator and fully draped 
I call Love in privacy ; the other, to the right, and entirely nude, 
is frank and free consciousness of self, and Love in the garb of 
Beauty. She is of intense Beauty and being nude she conveys 
some of the idea of the marvels seen in Aphrodite Urania, and 
leads thoughts to the New Life and the Great Mother. 

Giorgione, "the most poetic of painters," has painted a Venus, 
which is the most precious possession of the Dresden Gallery: 
she is a Venus, not an Aphrodite. The painting has the Greek 



THE GREAT MOTHER 145 

refined feeling for line, a splendor of curve, and a rhythm and 
balance of composition, such as we should expect in a Venus who 
glows with actual life and who is no angel. Giorgione's Venus 
is an interpretation of human grace, the Great Mother in the 
shape of a lovely woman. She is Love's joy over the light among 
the trees and upon the meadows of Arcadia. She is the spirit of 
Nature in the form of loveliness and therefore I see in her the 
Inner-Life as represented by the Minnesingers among the Mediae- 
val mysteries, as in Angelus Silesius, for instance, who loved 
green meadows more than the ascetic life. 

Botticelli's "Birth of Venus" in the Uffizi palace is a portrait 
and the form of the charming Simonetta and of "wonderful 
feeling for the rhythm of line," though the anatomy is wretched. 
This Venus, (Venus, not Aphrodite) is music of high pitch or 
love dressed in intellectual garb. Many similar expressions of 
the Inner-Life can be found among female Mystics of mediaeval 
nunneries ; such Mystics who lived on the sunny side of life. The 
Mother is revealed. 

Raphael's ideal of Aphrodite is that of the Roman Venus and 
may be seen in the Fornarina. It is love and Art with a strong 
arm and high bosom. Rather masculine. But Raphael also 
knew Venus Urania and has presented her in Christian garb and 
she may be seen in the famous Dresden gallery. In that Madonna 
"thought, passion and emotion become living melody," said J. 
A. Symonds. It is beauty in untouched virginity. More an ab- 
straction than an actuality. For a full description of her as a 
type of the Eternal Mother see my chapter on Madonnas. 

Corregio's Venus is realistic and commonplace. Leonardo's 
La Gioconda's "subtle and untranslateable smile" hints at love 
understandings and more than ordinary knowledge in love's 
mysteries. I see no Inner-Life in her. 

Thorwaldsen's Venus is classical purity of form standing self- 
centered and surrounded by the northern atmosphere of serenity. 
Less colossal than the Aphrodite of Melos, she is more harmoni- 
ous, but also without that large language of forms which the 
Inner-Life speaks. But she represents the Great Mother. 

George Watts is of all painters the most idealistic. His "Love 
and Life" and "Love and Death" are ideal in Plato's sense and 



146 THE GREAT MOTHER 

worthy to be modern parallels to Aphrodite Melos. His excellent 
imagination has produced forms suitable for a new religion: a 
religion of the Inner-Life. He has painted Love gently stooping 
down to Life and laying upon her "the mystic chrism of holy 
hands." In "Love and Death," Love is shown in the door pre- 
venting Death from entering to cut short the breath of the 
beloved. I have found this peculiarity with Watt's work, that I 
can replace his "Love" with "Art" personified and the substitu- 
tion translates his work into those deep silences where all shapes 
disappear and pure form arises; and that is a rare quality. It 
reveals the Great Mother. 

But the New Age will do still more for the Great Mother, and 
will see the line which will be her line. I can see it. It runs in 
an unbroken and continuous order from Greece until our day. 
I see it begin in majestic serenity in the Aphrodite of Melos, 
then it bends slightly, almost imperceptibly, in the Aphrodite of 
Cnidos, the work of Praxiteles. It checks itself for awhile under 
Christian austerity, but bends again in chaste desire in the Ren- 
aissance. Then it restrains itself, in fear as it seems, but soon 
recovers its original movement and at last fully reveals itself in 
Watt's miracles. 

Such is the rhythm of the line of love and beauty or the Great 
Mother drawn by Art, not by a single artist but by Art, Art as 
Energy, the Energy running through all the several ages. By 
such ensemble studies will the new Art arise and the New Age 
has given us the power to make it come forth. And the rhythm 
of that line is Art's gospel story of the Inner-Life and the Great 
Mother. And I invite and urge you to study that gospel. 

The power of expression in all the works mentioned is imparted 
by the Eternal Mother. To her be glory for ever and ever ! No 
real Art without her. 

II 

I have already spoken of Art as the Energy of the Great 
Mother. All the definitions I have given of Energy, Power and 
Action were dictated by the Inner-Life; they were formulated 
according to occult and mystic ideas. The principal idea was 
that all Art was a manifestation of the Magna Mater, the Great 
Mother. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 147 

The new aspect is in the direction of the Father-idea, just as 
the former was the Mother-idea. The Father-idea means here 
the Great Mother's Workmaster, the Demiurgic force. And as 
illustrations I use line and light. The symbols of the Father- 
idea in occidental Occultism and Mysticism are lines and light. 
Truly, Art is Power and Energy, but it is also splendor ; splendor 
of light and line. Energy and light or splendor, condition one 
another. No true Energy without that purity which manifests 
itself as light and in lines. On the other hand we find no true 
lines and no splendor except where there is Energy, Power. 
The same argument holds true when we speak of the Inner-Life. 
All Inner-Life is fundamentally powerful because it is a mani- 
festation of the Great-All, the Mother, and all Inner-Life comes 
into human existence as light, as understanding, as a revelation 
of fundamental mysteries. And again, the Inner-Life depends 
upon light, understanding or revelation in order to be known, and 
vice versa, mere light, understanding or revelation have no 
meaning unless they rest upon something substantial. Hence 
Inner-Life in essence and Inner-Life in manifestation condition 
each other in the same way as light and power condition each 
other. 

In my last chapter I dwelt more with principle than with Art 
actually, though I used many art products as illustrations. By 
necessity the art crafts, because they are human products, belong 
to the passing world, the sphere of manifestations and realiza- 
tions. Art, as represented by the crafts, belongs to the same 
sphere as pleasure which always is followed by pain. Art can not 
thrive without shadows ; therefore it can not live without definite 
lines. Whenever it paints light it is compelled to make darkness 
and whenever it has the power of fire in it, it is like human 
beings always in danger of self-destruction when it leaves its 
true field. And when it attempts its main object, namely, to 
manifest form, it usually looses itself in shapes ; that too is human. 
These characteristics suggest the human personality and we shall 
not go astray if we study Art as a personality, such as I suggest- 
ed in the foregone chapter. 

The human personality is the symbol by which we express our- 
selves. The physical universe is the personality through which 



148 



THE GREAT MOTHER 



the universal soul expresses itself. Lines, lights, fire and form 
make the personality of Art and I will deal with them that way. 
I shall not deal with lines as we deal with numbers in mathe- 
matics nor consider them, like numbers, as quantitative relation- 
ships; nay, I shall deal with lines and lights and forms as quali- 
tative relationships and regard them as their own symbols. They 
are values and it is as values they belong to the same family as 
the Inner-Life and express the Great Mother. Lines to the 
true artist can not be geometric forms, or impersonal and pro- 
saic propositions. They must be living, they must be personal, 
they must have a romantic character — if not, they are not light, 
and if not light they have only interest for the engineer, but not 
for the pen or the brush. Nor do they express the Great Mother's 
ideas. To my artist reader, I say: Look where you will in the 
Open and you shall see the lines I will speak about and hear Na- 
ture's language about form, light, fire and all the other synonyms 
of line as she understands herself. And you shall perceive the 
truth of my declaration that power and light are each other's 
complement or value; that structure is according to rhythm or 
the cosmic breath, and that Beauty is never expressed in weak 
limbs, but that Beauty is that compelling power which drives out 
of existence all that which is weak, mean and insincere, hence 
that Beauty is the true moral law of cosmic existence or the will 
and thought of our life as well as of the life in the Open. 

Look around in Mother Nature's realm and you shall see that 
she shows very few mathematically straight lines and where she 
does show them, as for instance in crystals, her forms belong to 
the inorganic, to that order of existence which once did but now 
no more dominates or appears to be her immediate concern as 
regards Beauty. Crystals and their hard and fast lines belong to 
a submerged world, a round of existence where Nature did not 
develop Beauty as she does now in the organic world. Lines are 
the stylus of the Infinite and that stylus knew form in earth's 
young days only in direct earnestness but not as now in wavy 
grace and undulating curves. The Great Mother is still showing 
her primitive forms in many children's undeveloped shapes; 
in small measures and scanty flesh. It is an exception when she 
shows the most beautiful line of all, the eliptic, and when she 
does, we are sure to find that she has other beauties in store and 



TH£ GREAT MOTHER 149 

high purposes in view. The eliptic is the most beautiful line, be- 
cause it is simplicity and suggests constant movement or life 
activity. It is the Great Mother's line in particular. It can not 
be made by a compasser because it changes its direction on all 
points. The elipse is manifoldness in oneness. In adolescence 
and young maturity Nature often shows the eliptic, and happy 
those who have the lines! They are the favored ones and they 
have in themselves proof of a high development. 

The straight crystal lines of Nature's young days were light 
too, and it was as light they spoke, and as light they speak now, 
when placed correctly. Light always speaks. Light is mind. 
JMo matter how insignificant an object may be, when it is flooded 
with light, it becomes eloquent. But the lines are not living, 
they are not "human" in quality. 

A line is not so much a thing as the expression of a substance 
or subject, the direction of its activity, its character as it were. 
I like to call a line a trumpet blast and there are lines on the 
human body I call trumpet blasts, because they have the power of 
a bugle. Look at Michael Angelo's "Aurora" and you will hear 
bugle calls. If the Great Mother ever spoke loudly in the manner 
of Art, Angelo has revealed her secret. Happy he or she who can 
see that secret again and thrice happy the model who can 
show that call by the living lines of the body. 

Look at the vigorous and courageous fishes which the angler 
longs for. For instance, the trout; all his strength lies in his 
lines and you can see it at once when you compare him to the 
clumsy carp. His silvery scales are as luminous as a light and 
his lines speak of form and the fire of his movement. Altogether 
he is the light of the stream; Beauty in the shape of light; and 
the artistic mind will admit that the fish has a character of a 
superior order, and the Mystic will speak of Inner-Life revealed 
in the water with as much enthusiasm as about the Inner-Life of 
a saint. Such a Mystic is what I call a Nature- Mystic. 

I spoke above about form, light, fire and said that these words 
were synonyms to line and that Nature used them synonymously. 
Artists will bear me out. There can be no valid objection to call- 
ing a line a light nor in calling a light a line. A sun ray 
illustrates what I mean. Nor will any artist have any difficulty 



150 THE GREAT MOTHER 

in calling sun-rays the form of that fire-energy which we popu- 
larly locate in the sun. It seems therefore easy to connect lines, 
light, fire and forms as synonymous. But I call them synonymous 
terms also in another sense. I see them as the building, the 
plastic, the constructive power both in Nature and in Man, and 
in all that activity of Man's, which evolves life and reveals the 
Inner-Life or the mystic life which goes to help him to self- 
realization. And that intensity in us by which we balance Na- 
ture's immensity expresses its form in lines that burn when men 
like Michael Angelo and Rembrandt draw them. Angelo's lines 
on the Aurora and Rembrandt's horizons are such lines and 
forms. 

Let the critic say that I am altogether too romantic in my 
view of lines. I will answer by inviting him to analyze a rose 
for instance. Analyze a rose as often as he will and let him 
translate all its aroma into botanical and chemical formulas ever 
so scientifically, he has not destroyed its poetry. Prosaic as he 
may be, next time he looks upon a rose, it conquers him. And 
so with the intensity of the lines I speak of, learn to see a 
living line and it shall be heard that lines have voices and that 
the mystic ear never tires of hearing them; it tires as little as 
the mystic eye ever tires of looking upon them. The mystic eye 
would cease to be in the moment it ceased to see the splendor 
of living lines. 

Look at the strong and ferocious tiger, the fleet deer or the 
wild horse and you see at once that Beauty means line and light 
and fire. Even the mob can pick out a thoroughbred horse from 
among ordinary horses. His long and graceful curves on neck, 
loin and quarters, his general symmetry, at once demonstrate that 
line which means fire and light. His carriage reveals a vigor 
only found in combination with highest forms of beauty. It is 
Inner-Life; it is the Mother's work. Many an athlete is not in- 
telligent as regards books and learning and society manners, but 
his distinguished bearing is light nevertheless. His frame is like 
embodied sunlight and his own explanation for being. It is 
Inner-Life manifested. Healthy warm and fresh skin, shiny 
hair, and ruddy cheeks are Nature's lights and certificates of 
Beauty and Inner-Life; but a muddy skin means kidney disease 
and a dull, cold and ghastly complexion means consumption and 



THE GREAT MOTHER 15 1 

ugliness, and Nature usually makes haste to remove such misrep- 
resentations. 

Now, let me say something about light and come back to the 
line by and by. 

It is hard to define Beauty, but I consider it an objective power 
or light. Beauty is light. In my opinion it certainly is not merely 
subjective or an individual appreciation. 

When Shulamite in Solomon's song (v 10) glories in the de- 
scription of her Beloved and speaks of him as "white and ruddy", 
she boasts of something real, and when Jacob chose Rachael be- 
cause of her bright eyes in preference to the dull eyes of Leah, 
he too, thought of Beauty as something real. And what did the 
Shulamite and Jacob understand by real Beauty? They meant 
that color is Nature's stamp of approval, her certificate of purity. 
Of course, they had never heard of Ruskin's assertion about the 
holiness of color, but they knew instinctively and with as much 
certainty as all Nature, that color is the sign of health, of em- 
bodied sunlight. 

I have chosen the expressions of the Shulamite and Jacob 
rather than some illustration from any paintings because neither 
of these two were speaking before art students about colors and 
therefore not likely to loose themselves in enthusiastic ex- 
pressions and declarations. They simply and naturally 
expressed their perceptions of quality and that is the point 
I want to emphasize as regards color and light. If it be true ( — 
and there can hardly be any doubt about it — ) that light is a 
phenomenon arising from the vibration of the object and that 
color is merely various qualities of light; if that be true, then 
color becomes an exact reflex of the personality or object seen. 

The Shulamite said her Beloved was "white and ruddy" and 
by that she gave the daughters of Jerusalem an exact descrip- 
tion and definition of him as a personality. I shall not under- 
take to give the description in detail, but this I mean to say that 
the quality of his life was revealed to her and to them; that she 
discovered that harmonious interplay of the spiritual and the 
sensuous which is so necessary for Beauty and that the soul of 
the Beloved had exerted that captivating power which is always 
the characteristic of Beauty. The Shulamite could say so much 
in so few words because inherent Beauty and moral quality vi- 



152 THE GREAT MOTHER 

brate in the reflex that comes to us, when we look upon a person. 
The Beauty quality literally vibrates from the object and unerr- 
ingly reflects itself upon the retina of our eye — but, how many, 
even of artists, use their eyes as the mirrors on which such re- 
flexes come objectively? And here is a point to consider and 
study. 

If the pupils of our eyes dance around and up and down in 
their sockets and are not kept still and our breathing lowered as 
much as it is possible, we can not use our eyes as mirrors and 
consequently never get light and Beauty objectively, but only 
subjectively or which is almost the same: we get no light and no 
Beauty. We get our own confusion thrown back upon us. 

Life is a light and if the colorist wishes to portray it, he or 
she must learn how Nature vibrates or throws off her life po- 
tensies ; must learn how nerve-form can be seen ; how the glow- 
worm lights his lamp ; how many plants shine in darkness ; even 
the common marigold becomes luminous after a week of dry 
weather; how we become luminous by our own intensity. A 
good way to study these phenomena is to observe yourself dili- 
gently in a good mirror, say before or after the bath or any other 
convenient time. By so doing one becomes familiar with one- 
self and will learn to discover the light which the body throws 
off and which correctly indicates our Beauty and moral value. 
In the degree in which we have physical and spiritual life our 
personality burns like a flame and can easily be seen and esti- 
mated. It is not only the saint who has such an aura, nay, every 
human being has it and can not be truly portrayed except by 
means of it. — It is very often the case that people will not be- 
lieve that their photograph is a true likeness. But in most cases 
it is. The lens is truth itself and cannot be bribed any more than 
the light of the person photographed. 

Another good way to study the light which is life reflected, 
or life translated so that it can fall upon the observer's eye, is 
to begin your studies with the simplest structures, because in 
Nature they are the only creatures which are luminous. The 
more complicated organization of creatures in the higher scales 
of life diminishes the power of luminosity, especially if the or- 
ganization is a result of all the unhealthy methods of living 
originated by modern culture. While luminosity in the sense I 



THE GREAT MOTHER 153 

have just spoken of, diminishes on the higher scales of life, it 
is reflected by lights of another order, light drawn from another 
world so to say. But that light I am not speaking of now. 
You all know Whitman's great line about himself : 

I am an acme of things accomplished, and I am an ac- 
claimer of things to be. 

Others besides Whitman can say the same or others can say it 
for them. I, for instance, can say it for a lady whom I, acci- 
dentally, saw throw herself down on a sofa, tired, or rather ex- 
hausted. In spite of that unfavorable condition of tiredness, the 
pose, taken entirely unconsciously and without any regard to me 
as a possible spectator, was the very embodiment of strength in 
artistic lines and an illumination of the truth that Beauty is a 
light of its own and objective. As never before, it flashed upon 
me what inherent marvels of structure such a body would re- 
veal if I could have examined it. And when I took out my 
catechism of the Inner-Life and began silently to ask questions, 
I was obliged to admit that the structure which I guessed at 
behind that involuntary pose was built up through "immense 
preparations" and that the soul behind it had mounted many and 
many a step on the mystic path in order to attain such healthi- 
ness, such color, such firmness, such eloquence. The spectacle 
I thus saw came to me by the unerring light which her body 
threw off and which my eye just at that moment was able to 
catch. A portrait must be painted by means of that light; a 
landscape has no eloquence unless it prints itself in that way 
upon our eye. That there were lines of marvels back of that 
light, goes without saying. What I thus far have said was 
suggested by Shulamite's description of "the white and ruddy" 
beloved. I also quoted Jacob before and spoke of his choosing 
Rachael on account of bright eyes instead of Leah who had dull 
eyes. By bright eyes I think Jacob meant that flash in the eye, 
which painters usually paint white, though it is yellow. It is a 
distinctive sign of health and genius in man and full of charming 
impressiveness in woman. In Mona Lisa it is shrewdness, how- 
ever, and reveals an insight which is not compatable with in- 
nocence. 

"Bright eyes" in this sense is truly a vibration of the life of 



154 TH E GREAT MOTHER 

the person whose eyes flash it. It should be studied with the 
greatest care, for without it no picture of the soul can be given 
and the portrait will be insignificant. It reflects the Inner-Life. 
The light is, as I said, truly yellow and not white, and it re- 
minds me of the glossy yellow hue of the buttercup. It is the 
gloss that gives the peculiar animating color to the buttercup. 
As little as any body can be sad looking upon or into a buttercup 
as little can any body fail to be attracted by the burst of sunshine 
which comes from eyes like Rachael's. The buttercups are poetry 
and sentiment; the eyes exhibit the soul. Light everywhere re- 
vealing life! I think artists could learn much from the Kab- 
balah, the Jewish mystical science, which claims to know the 
Inner-Life power of every organ, muscle and nerve. I repeat 
what I said before, Beauty is an objectivity and though I am 
unable to give it a logical and mathematical definition, it can 
nevertheless be experienced and that is the best proof of its ex- 
istence, and the illustrations I have brought forth go far to prove 
what I have said. 

Beauty shines in structure and organization. I will not dis- 
pute about matter, whether real or not, but I will assert, that 
organization or structure is the all important study for an artist 
and for the Inner-Life. Organization or structure is self-forma- 
tion or the essential quality of all that which our senses and our 
thoughts can grasp. It is its own cause and effect. It is seminal 
and original. Without structure or form there can be no Art 
and no Inner-Life; no stability and no law. It represents ideas, 
not things. Proportion, line and pose give life, whether our 
figure is nude or draped. Unfortunately numerous people are 
form-blind just as there are multitudes who are color-blind. 
They are all excluded from Art and the Inner-Life and the 
Great Mother does not love them aesthetically. 

Artists seldom attempt to reproduce the inanimate Nature. 
They prefer to deal with the living or that which once lived or 
lives in the living, the realm of volition, feeling, intellect. And 
why? Because animated Nature belongs to the same family 
as the artists and reveals organization, an ever attractive qual- 
ity and a sure sign of high spiritual development. When I look 
upon a landscape it is not the color of the mountains or the haze 
of the distance that fascinates me, but the lines of the whole 



THE GREAT MOTHER 155 

vision and the great eye out there in the horizon that invite 
me to discover, if I can, the form and shape of structure or 
organization. And I am happy and come away with joy in my 
soul when I have discovered the family-likeness between the 
landscape and myself. And when I look upon a living model, 
I do not approach with geometrical proportions in my eyes, be- 
cause I know that it is the human eye which makes geometry. 
Nature does not care for such rigid shapes nor for academic 
colors. I look upon the model with a sympathetic eye and try to 
understand the mute language of muscles, members and poses. 
I look for the type, for the spirit of the whole and for the Great 
Mother. I do that because I know that lines, that structure, 
have the magic power of bringing out the reason there is in or- 
ganic life and it is the organism I wish to behold and its Inner- 
Life, I wish to become acquainted with. And when I get a 
glimpse of the mysteries I go away with the words of Charles 
Kingsley upon my lips: "Oh, what an imagination God must 
have." 

Many years ago when I was a professor and taught botany, 
I did not spend much time upon stamens and pistils and similar 
details. I took my pupils out into the Open and asked why one 
plant would seek the stony and dry slope of a hill with con- 
stant exposure to a fierce sun, and why another could only thrive 
in the deep watery dells, and I tried to divine from their colors, 
structure and general behavior what one meant by its dignified 
and robust strength and the other by its graceful and delicate 
tenderness. I communed with that Beauty which is behind form 
and shape. 

You understand then that the Inner-Life seeks intelligence, 
clearness and thought. It holds it as an axiom as firmly as any 
art school that you can not grow in spiritual life any more than 
you can produce a work of art unless you can interpret your feel- 
ings in line or word. Vague reveries are delightful, but they 
do not make Inner-Life. Warm colors arouse a slumbering gen- 
ius, perhaps, but they do not make an artist. The artist must 
study and work. The aspirant for Inner-Life must study by 
prayer and devotion. Otherwise none of them shall reach 
the goal. All beauty demands form or clear and definite ex- 
pression. All Inner-Life is bought at a price. And the price 



156 THE GREAT MOTHER 

is the study of structure, organization, form and shape. But 
to study form and shape we must merge into it. We must call 
upon the Great Mother. To the everlasting shame of most peo- 
ple, and probably also to the shame of many artists, be it said 
that they live in the midst of Nature, yet are strangers to her. 
The fact is, we are surrounded by her large arms and lie in her 
lap, unable to move if we wished, and unable to enter into her 
if we tried. Most people never see her face. Occasionally in 
summer vacation they feel her breath, but do not know what 
happens. And yet on every summer vacation morning, they 
might see the splendor of dew on the grass, but they do not 
see it. And it is so strange, because these people have not out- 
grown the senses. It is not spirituality that binds them. It 
seems to me that such people have not even developed their senses 
nor know the joy of sense life. Think of what they miss! 
They must be like moles in the ground. They imagine they live, 
but are dead. 

But let us forget these moles. Let me address you, my reader, 
as artists and lovers of the Open and send you to Mother 
Nature to find some new mysteries. Let me send you out into 
the woods and when you have found a spot gently sloping and 
covered with trees, bushes and shrubs, then seat yourself on the 
ground, or better still, lie flat. By no means must you stand up. 
When you have found a restful position and become one with 
your surroundings, then let your vision slide along the ground 
and the stems, straight, gnarled and otherwise, and you shall 
understand the power and charm of light as it blends with the 
fumes of what I will call the skin of the soil. Look at it for a 
long time and when you come next time to the same place, try to 
paint the influence exerted upon you, and your painting will be 
the Inner-Life of the woods, or if you like to put it differently, 
the spirit of the woods: the fume or aroma of space and a 
vision of the Great Mother. 

I know my description of this procedure can not convey even 
a faint gleam of what I suggest. But this is a fact, that as lit- 
tle as you can catch the irridescent hue of mother-of-pearl with- 
out the shell that holds it because it is intrinsic and necessary to 
the shell, as little shall you be able to paint soil in its true 
color. No direct view of my sloping hill reveals its breath, only 



THE GREAT MOTHER 157 

by stooping down shall you discover the light that is truly of the 
land. It is not "a light that never was on sea nor land," on the 
contrary, it is like the sheen or gloss of soft skin, as delicate as 
the dew on the apricot and as lustrous as the liquid gleam on a 
passionate eye. I ha*ve rarely seen the mystery in any painting 
and all the landscape painting I have seen has all failed to even 
suggest what I have seen in reality. I can, however, mention 
one painting which is an exception to that which I have just said. 
It is Rousseau's "Winter Sunlight" at the forest of Fontainebleau. 
It hangs now in the Metropolitan Art Museum in New York. 
That painting expresses my meaning. Whether Rousseau reas- 
oned like myself or not, I do not know, but of this I am sure, 
that instinctively he searched for the mystery and the Inner- 
Life. I have conferred with an artist on the subject and it was 
a pleasant surprise to have my ideas confirmed. The light itself 
seems to play hide and seek with the beauty of the curved lines 
of the slope I speak of and wistfully it reflects itself from the 
leaves like the flashes which we sometimes receive from the 
healthy hair on the head of a vigorous person. 

I speak so much about this light because it truly is of the land 
or soil, yet also as truly — even if I contradict myself — "a light 
that never was on sea nor land," viz., it is Inner-Life. 

The philosopher of antiquity, Zeno, called Beauty "the flower 
of virtue" and this is exactly what I will say about light now, 
not only of the light on my slope, but of light, that intangible 
something which artists perhaps never shall fully chain to earth, 
but which they nevertheless for ever and ever must worship and 
endeavor to draw down and perhaps at last give mankind as a 
magic that will set us free. Mark this "set us free." Neither 
science nor morals can set us free. Art can ! Science can teach 
us the use of Nature's power and how to endure her willfulness. 
Morals may teach us how to control our natural senses, and 
morals do it by robbing us of three-fourths of our life. But 
Art, the aesthetic state, alone prepares us to free ourselves from 
all that which shackles and oppresses. And one of the powers of 
Art, which does this is light; light as it has been given to man 
of the Occident to understand it. The Oriental world is not free 
in the sense in which the Occident is. And the Orient has none of 
our light-marvels in painting to show, and the Orient, I declare, 



158 THE GREAT MOTHER 

does not know the sublimity of a line, such as the Greeks saw 
lines and such as we may study them. 

Like Zeno said "Beauty is the flower of virtue", so I say that 
the light I speak of springs from intrinsic qualities. Applying 
Zeno's definition to the lines of my slope and the light upon it, 
you can readily see that you can never understand them nor in- 
terpret them artistically unless you try to reproduce them as the 
virtue of the soil, as intrinsic quality. 

Mystics say that God can only be approached in prayer. I 
do not think any real Art is possible except by way of the Inner- 
Life. I think it was William Hunt who used to say, that it was 
not until he got down and crawled that he could make any head- 
way on a portrait. 

I hope artists will cultivate the Inner-Life and if they do, 
the New Art will come, an Art as never known before. It will 
be an Art that reveals the mysteries of life. I will declare that 
there is a power among us, which is not only line and light, but 
a living line and light, a light equal to human energy, a light and 
line which is creative; which is plastic and formative; a light 
and a line which is the manifestation of that power I spoke of 
in my last chapter: the fundamental art energy. When I speak 
of light, I do not mean the optical phenomenon, though that is 
no doubt the fact which most artists must reproduce in some way 
or other and interpret as best they can. I would rather think 
of self-expression ; of living Beauty ; of passions gushing forth ; 
of spring mornings, and soul growth. The light that shines in 
the universe is a sublimity sprung from an ur-ground or abyss 
that we cannot fathom. It is nothing definite. It is ever vary- 
ing, unstable and untameable. I have seen it at times as a flash 
from an eye as it were ; an eye something like that mystery which 
Jacob Bohme saw. It is an eye clearly defined as a human 
eye, yet not of space though in space : an eye that both sees and 
speaks. An eye that resembles a looking glass which also both 
sees and speaks as you know. An eye and a looking glass from 
which streams a light equal to eternal wisdom and in which we 
may see our true form. The peculiarity with this universal eye is 
this, that it is never final ; it is always in the state of coming to be ; 
in one moment it contains the all of the eternal Now, in the 
next, it flashes original and aboriginal ideas, only to leap into 



THE GREAT MOTHER 1 59 

the future with pictures that we of the present moment can not 
comprehend nor even reflect because our own eyes are unde- 
veloped. It is such an eye that is called "a seeing eye." Artists 
and Inner-Life people have it. The others think they see, but 
they see not. While this eye apparently is objective, it also seems 
to be born from moment to moment and to be purely subjective. 
It is this fact, that the eye grows from moment to moment, which 
gives it the ever reborn power I spoke of before; and why the 
mystic eye never can tire of looking upon living lines and the 
light they throw off. The light that flashes from this eye is 
movement, rather than something moved. It is a process, an 
everlasting process, a magic fire, that yet has more than the 
power of real fire. It appears to be the spirit proceeding from 
the eternal abyss and it seeks an abiding place with us. It is 
the Great Mother's "Presence." It has this quality : that it seeks 
an abiding place with us, and that gives us the power to hold it 
and it is an invitation to us to take hold of it. 

There is a passage in Wordsworth's "Excursion" which has 
given me much pleasure and often symbolized to me that light 
I speak of. The passage is this: — 

For the growing youth, 
What soul was his, when, from the naked top 
Of some bold headland he beheld the sun 
Rise up and bathe the world in light? 

he looked — 

Ocean and earth, the solid frame of earth, 
And ocean's liquid mass, in gladness lay 

Beneath him : far and wide the clouds were touched 

And in their silent faces could he read 
Unutterable love. Sound needed none, 
Nor any voice of joy; his spirit drank 
The spectacle: sensation, soul and form, 
All melted into him; they swallowed up 
His animal being; in them did he live, 
And by them did he live; they were his life. 
In such access of mind, in such high hour 
Of visitation from the living God, 
Thought was not; in enjoyment it expired. 



i6o 



THE GREAT MOTHER 



No thanks he breathed; he proffered no request; 
Rapt into still communion that transcends 
The imperfect offices of prayer and praise, 
His mind was a thanksgiving to the power 
That made him; it was blessedness and love! 

The point in the poem I refer to as containing such marvelous 
psychological insight and so fully describing the synthetic activity 
of mind, which I often call immediateness, lies in the lines 

"In such access of mind, in such high hour," 
etc., etc., 



Not only is the psychology of the passage marvelous, but it is 
wonderfully rich as a type of that new revelation of light and 
life which is the gift to all progressive people of this age. And 
it is just such conditions an artist in our day needs. 

The whole passage is flooded with light. The words used are 
so many shades of color and the progress of the description is 
activity of a spiritual order. There is a fullness of splendor 
over all the lines which lifts the whole passage into a sphere 
where, as I said, I wish to speak about living Beauty, passions 
gushing forth, spring mornings and soul growth, because the 
passage is so full of illumination that we can only think of light 
as it must be in its original nature far beyond our ordinary hu- 
man eye. 

No matter who "the growing youth" was, he felt that fullness 
which is transcendence and the joy of being oneself. For the 
moment being all feelings melted into one and the boy stood 
in the universal all. And why should this boy's experiences not 
be models for artists? To prove that his experience was no 
mere transient joy, I ask this question: — What were his expe- 
riences after that sublime moment just described? Wordsworth 
tells us that the youth often had such intercourses with Nature 
and his own self and while he had learned from the Bible about 
immortality, this learning was as naught as learning. 

But in the mountains did he feel his faith. 
All things, responsive to the writing, there 



THE GREAT MOTHER l6l 

Breathed immortality, revolving life, 
And greatness still revolving; infinite: 
There littleness was not; the least of things 
Seemed infinite; and there his spirit shaped 

Her prospects, nor did he believe he saw. 

What wonder if his being thus became 
Sublime and comprehensive! 

These words prove that the experience was not a mere tran- 
siency or something like a subjective sensation. Wordsworth 
will have us believe and learn that which he himself had ex- 
perienced, that in such glorious moments we literally taste the 
immortal life and truly live the Inner-Life and perceive the 
"Presence." He will let us see by a "quick dance of colors, lights 
and forms" what it is possible for us to put into painting, dance 
and music, if we live the Inner-Life, and are artists with a living 
image-making power and have the ability to force the passing 
wind from the wilds, from the hills and valleys, lakes and water- 
falls, to make music out of confusion. But my quotation is not 
made solely for the benefit of artists. All may be sublimated and 
lifted into the highest Nature if they are innocent enough. Nor 
is it necessary to ascend mountain promontories. Young love 
knows the light and enthusiasm, though it has seldom told us 
about its experience because it has been overcome by its own 
fullness. 

I say again, let an artistic genius stand before a model whose 
limbs and whole figure breathe intelligence, and the sculptor 
becomes another Pygmaleon awakening the Galathea of his own 
highest being. And where is the Nature-lover who not at some 
time, while scanning the laws of light amid the roar of cataracts 
or the blessed peace among high trees, felt the severe charm of 
sun rays and who has not been led to dream about Nature's forms 
and spirit. I think Corot must have been full of the Inner-Life 
such as the forest's fullness can teach it by light. 

To put this mystery in a form more tangible, I say this light 
is the image-making power within us. I do not call it imagina- 
tion, for that term cannot express that which I wish to say, I 
said the image-making power within us. Imagination is purely 
subjective. But the image-making faculty is objectively in us. It 



1 62 THE GREAT MOTHER 

is creative. It is "Presence." This image-making power is 
aboriginal, self-existent and not induced. It pertains to itself 
and plucks its own fruits. It is independent of experience and 
is not of time, but sheds fragrance in hearts that live in tune. 
It elevates all things and takes them into the soul of life and the 
universe. Where the image-making power is active it renews 
life and regenerates all efforts. As for thinking and so-called 
logic : these have no power over it. It is above bars and bolts of 
thought, but it desires to control thought and it wishes to guide 
our hands. The image-making power is a great laboratory and a 
necromancer. It transmutes itself everlastingly but it always 
aims at giving life to dead forms and to put poetry where the 
sands of sin threaten to destroy. Out of the simplest material 
it weaves the costliest garments and fashions the vessels of our 
treasures. It was the image-making power that carved figures 
of the reindeer on the knife handles of that paleolithic man who 
lived at Dordogne more than 50,000 years ago. It was this same 
power that erected the pyramids in Egypt and Mexico and 
which to-day gives us all the marvelous inventions of our age. 
And it is that image-making power which will explain what I 
say. 

And what is it? It is simply and neither more nor less than 
our most glorious Inner-Life expressing itself in images and, 
as I said, the Great Mother's Presence. 

Whatever you call it, do not forget to include terms that 
characterize our original wild nature, all that in us which is un- 
bounded, daemonic, vast and boiling and also that which can not 
be accounted for; that which is "immense in passion, pulse and 
power." 

It is this image-making power, I am enthusiastic about and 
wish I could arouse similar enthusiasm for in my readers. It is 
that power which has revealed to me what I know about lines, 
light and forms and which I know will teach me much more in 
the future. It is the Path of the Mother. 

Ill 

In the first chapter I spoke of Art and the Inner-Life as 
energy, power and activity and all my definitions rested upon one 



THE GREAT MOTHER 163 

of the fundamental ideas in all Mysticism and Occultism, namely 
upon the Mother-idea. 

In the second chapter I again drew my ideas and expositions 
from Mysticism and Occultism. My definitions of line, light and 
form rested on the Father-idea. 

By simple logic and by continuing on mystic and occult ground, 
I shall now speak in the same vein and rest my chapter on the 
Inner-Life conception of the Child. 

By the Child I shall understand the artist who produces true 
Art and thereby becomes the Child of the Great Mother. 

I shall also use the term Child as an expression for a certain 
mysterious action that takes place in Nature and in a conscious 
life and which religion calls at-one-ment, redemption, etc. But 
I will use these two terms sparingly. I prefer, and will use, the 
following terms and phrases: re-conciliation of opposites — the 
restoration of life on a new basis — re-juvenescence and re-birth. 
These terms are much more elastic than those of religion and 
cover a sound philosophy and much Nature-Mysticism, and 
instruct us about the Great Mother's power. And they express 
some important features of the life of an artist. And this last 
point is of much interest since this chapter deals with the artist 
rather than with Art. 

But what has Art to do with reconciliation, is asked? How 
can religious terms be used when we talk Art? Let us see! 
Both Art and the artist have very much to do with a process 
that resembles religion! Art, I assert, is a reconciling power in 
life, a power for rebirth and this I will prove ! A thought is 
not real or of value till it is expressed in form. An emotion 
can not be understood or be conveyed to another unless it man- 
ifests itself. Both thought and emotion need Art in order to 
transplant themselves and to at-one themselves with life. Art 
therefore is clearly their reconciling element. Philosophy suffers 
from a great defect when it enters practical life; it abstracts us 
instead of uniting us. But Art is intensely human and always 
connects itself with human interests, and that is the eminence 
and glory of Art. It is always a uniter, because it is so human. 
And for that reason Art is the best Yoga. No matter how the 
artist works, if his or her work is Art, it is a revelation of soul 



164 THE GREAT MOTHER 

and the soul's endeavor and longing for union, at-one-ment and 
reconciliation with the Highest. 

All Beauty search and endeavor is yearning for union with 
some form of the Highest, a union which can give rest, and that 
peace which the soul needs in order to find itself. And all 
Beauty search ends by finding the Highest because Beauty is as 
Plato has told us, "the interpreter and mediator between God 
and man." It is by no means the exclusive province of religion, 
as some maintain, to work for man's reconciliation to the Eter- 
nal. Art is not only also engaged in that office, but in many 
ways much more powerful than religion to effect that eternal 
peace and happiness which the soul calls for. When the prin- 
ciples of justice, religion, mercy or persuasion fail to affect us, 
Beauty still has avenues on which to enter. Moreover, Beauty 
has the power to calm and to create bliss and remove oppressing 
thoughts. Beauty can do that by mere Presence, but religion 
must try to do it by persuasion and sacraments. 

True colors can melt a hardened heart; noble lines can clear 
confused thoughts: pure sounds can find entrance and create 
profound impulses where culture otherwise has no power. All 
these elements of Art bring divinity nearer to us and raise us 
above ourselves. Therefore when I now speak about reconcil- 
iation, redemption and atonement, I do not speak as the relig- 
ious teachers do about sin and salvation, but about bringing 
agreement where contradiction seems to exist, and about estab- 
lishing concord where strife has brought disturbance and con- 
fusion; and I speak about adjusting discrepancies; about level- 
ing the uneven; about right proportions, etc., etc. Art can and 
does reconcile such opposites and disturbances. Those of 
experience know it. But because I speak of contradictions and 
disturbances, it must not be understood that the world is at 
strife with itself as some teachers make it a business to teach us. 
Opposites arise, not on account of any real split or disturbance 
in the world, how profound the so-called disturbances may seem 
to be; opposites arise in the rush for manifestation in life; 
opposites and divergencies are proof of health and of beauty- 
endeavor and there would not have been Beauty, such as we hu- 
man beings know it, long for it, and find it, if life did not mani- 
fest itself in so numerous and varied forms as it does. At this 



THE GREAT MOTHER 165 

point, the difference between the view and value of life as seen 
by Art and unitive philosophy becomes apparent. That high and 
abstract view taught by so many, whose will is good enough, 
but whose knowledge of the Inner-Life is very limited, pro- 
duces a life utterly intangible, flat and unreal; it is a life — if 
life it can be called — which is dark darkness: utter negativity 
and without any attractions for real live human beings. Art, 
on the other hand, gives us a life of warmth and color, full of 
pulsations and satisfactions and makes us feel the joy of living. 
And all that because Art makes use of opposites and does not 
deny them nor run away from them. Art produces also re- 
conciliations in other senses. It calls forth self-revelations in 
that artist who really produces Art, viz., who produces some- 
thing which springs from the soul's innermost compelling power. 
Such a product is his or her self-reconciliation. Such art prod- 
ucts are the artist's Children even if they are so individual and 
different from the artist that he or she cannot see they are 
themselves over again. Be they ever so individual and inde- 
pendent, they become reconcilers nevertheless. It will be seen 
when I call your attention to the classical story of Venus and 
Cupid. Venus, the mother, could not live in peace except for 
Cupid, the son. She could not exercise her personality except 
by the help of her son. Her reconciliation to the external 
world was accomplished through him. The same will also be 
seen when it is realized that Mary, the mother of Jesus, herself 
needed the salvation He brought to the world. The dogma of 
her immaculate conception does not remove the peculiar fact, 
that her own son became her reconciliation. Both stories bear 
upon the fact I wish to illustrate that Art is the artist's Child, 
or self-expression and reconciliation. 

Let me illustrate the meaning of this self-revelation in a work 
of Art by telling Ovid's story about Pygmalion and Galathea. 
All the details of the story are of importance in order to see 
the self-revelation of Pygmalion. The final happy union of the 
two is his self -reconciliation. The story is marvelous in its 
symbology and is to my mind the gospel story, the Yoga of 
reconciliation such as Art preaches it. And it reaches infinitely 
deeper than the Bible story of reconciliation because the artist 
can verify in himself the reconciling elements, while the Bible 



\ 



l66 THE GREAT MOTHER 

story requires faith to believe that an external event has taken 
place. The story typifies the Great Mother's self -revelation in 
us. 

King Pygmalion was a sculptor, and being disgusted with the 
sensuality of the women of his day, he did not marry, but he 
adored Femininity nevertheless, and knew in his inner life that 
a superb woman existed somewhere, could he only find her. 
Being a true man, he asked his own mind how such a woman 
would look, and his heart made answer, that he should carve 
his ideal in ivory and thus manifest his own innermost. He did 
so and the woman proved to be a creation that Pygmalion 
thought even Nature could not match. He not only admired 
her, but she seemed alive and acted with maidenly modesty, he 
fancied. His own Art overwhelmed him. His reason told him 
that he was mad, but his fire was uncontrollable. The ivory 
seemed to blush and the lips to move and most naturally Pyg- 
malion kissed and embraced the statue. Yet she stood there and 
remained immovable. But he could not be persuaded that she 
was mere ivory. He brought her gifts, rare shells, oriental 
pearls and sparkling stones. He sent birds of sweet song into 
her room, and fragrant flowers, and costly robes and rings. 

An embroider'd zone surrounded her slender waist 
Thus like a queen array'd, so richly dress'd 
Beauties she show'd, but unadorn'd the best. 

In all these acts, Pygmalion revealed his own artistic temper. 
The acts were truly his, but they also created him. He became 
the Child of his own longings and activities and it is as a Child 
of his own yearning that he became the reconciliation or at-one- 
ment of inner and outer. Thus he illustrates the perfect artist. 
Shortly after came the feast of Aphrodite, a solemn day on 
which all the Cypriots paid devotion to her. Aphrodite, being 
the Greek Mother-Goddess first, and next, the Beauty-Goddess, 
was the special object of adoration of all artists and of Pygmal- 
ion especially. 

— With gilded horns the milk-white heifers 
Slaughtered before the sacred altars bled. — 



THE GREAT MOTHER 167 

And Pygmalion prayed: 

"Give me the likeness of my ivory maid." 

The golden goddess present at the prayer 
Well knew he meant th' inanimated fair, 
And gave the sign of granting his desire. 

While the goddess granted the desire, she did not give life to 
the statue. She granted the desire, but Pygmalion was himslf to 
animate his work. Such is the nature of the universal economy. 
No miracles are performed. A lover may pray for the posses- 
sion of his beloved object and his prayer may be granted, but he 
himself must take possession of her and accomplish the grant. 
The same takes place in artistic production. The artist may be 
endowed with genius and may be given a call to do a great 
work: But neither genius nor the call accomplishes anything. It 
is he, the artist ( — the reconciliation of the call and the ex- 
ecution — ) he, the Child born of the genius and toil, it is he who 
manifests. And so Pygmalion turned to his statue to infuse 
it with life. He kissed her and the lips grew soft and softer; 
the former mass turned to vibrating form; he felt her pulses 
and the leaping vein and suddenly the eyes opened. "And 
view'd at once the light and lover with surprise" ; and a miracle 
had been done. Extremes were melted into one and two beings 
were created: the artist and his work, Galathea. In course of 
time a boy was born to them and he is a further proof of the 
reconciliation. He represents the evidence before the world 
and the fame of the artist. The boy is the monument the trav- 
ellers come to see and to admire; he is the fact mentioned in 
art-history and whom succeeding artists come to study and draw 
inspiration from. Galathea was Pygmalion's creation or Child; 
but he too was a Child and born out of his own Art and devotion. 
His Art united him to himself ; it reconciled him to life. 

Besides Pygmalion and Galathea, there is in Art another con- 
ception which explains what reconciliation means to an artist. 
That conception is named Euphorion. 

Goethe originated the name Euphorion and gave it to the 
child born in the mystic marriage of Faust and Helena. Since 



l68 THE GREAT MOTHER 

then all lovers and artists call their child Euphorion, be the 
marriage one of the inner and the outer of the same personality, 
or, be the marriage one of the Platonic order between the two 
sexes. Or be the mystic marriage represented by a work of Art 
in which they have put their whole life. The word Euphorion in 
translation means "the swift" and that clearly suggests descent 
of spirit, sudden flashes of light and ecstatic communions. 

There is an interesting point in this that Helena, who becomes 
the mother of Faust's child, has centuries before given some- 
what of her life to the same Faust. She is both his mother and 
his wife and that is so very interesting : viz., The true Art image, 
Euphorion, can only be born of the artist's own better self, a 
better self that has followed him always and everywhere as wife, 
yet is not discovered till Euphorion is born. The Inner-Life 
of the true artist is pictured in the relation of Faust, Helena 
and Euphorion, and the full meaning of Art as a reconciliation 
can best be studied by Goethe's exposition. There is still an- 
other mystery about the Child. Euphorion in Art is the same 
as Christianity in religion. Christianity rightly understood is a 
worship of the Child. The Child is named Jesus. But in Art, 
the Child is the artist himself or herself. In the most literal 
sense the artists are born of their Art. 

Study Sophocles and simply substitute the words technique 
and faithful work where he sings of suffering and submission 
until the heart is purified, and the will subdued. If my reader 
will do that, it shall be found that Sophocles with unrivaled 
skill portrays both the struggles of the Inner-Life and the 
process that goes to make an artist, one born of his own Art. 
What he calls moral law is simply that truth which Art con- 
stantly holds up before us and demands obedience to. From 
Sophocles it may easily be learned that every artist is another 
Oedipus who solves the riddle propounded by the Sphinx and 
who kills her. An artist who goes through such degrees of 
purification becomes a Child of his own Art. His toil is his re- 
conciliation and perfection as an artist. Take Dante as another 
model and learn from him that high view of seeing all things in 
the Great Mother, and surely She shall be seen in all things. 
Insensibly we become what we see in our patterns. That is the 
way life keeps the balance or makes reconciliation. We become 



THE GREAT MOTHER 1 69 

what we love! If the personal terms of Dante are thought 
undesirable then instead of God speak with Walt Whitman 
about "cosmic enthusiasm" and realize "that a Kelson of the 
creation is love" and the result is the same : re-birth. 

A study of these three, Sophocles, Dante and Whitman, to- 
gether with the daily experience in the practice of any of the 
Arts, will soon show that artists are the Children of their own 
Art, and that Art is Yoga. When Art has the effect of uniting 
us to ourselves, of giving us re-birth, then it is Art indeed, and 
Art of the highest order. It is then no mere craft. The Great 
Mother is then present. The ancient cathedral builders may be 
called craftsmen; but no matter what they be called, they and 
their works were reconcilers, and the proof of my assertion will 
be understood by those who ( — no matter how — ) have ever 
awakened their sense of the infinite or who have been touched 
by the spirit of Beauty. Let us quarrel no more about the pow- 
ers which Art has to reconcile us! Art is the artist's religion! 

Reconciliation then is not a process of law which brings people 
into an amicable relationship; it is a self-revelation which pro- 
duces self-realization. It is re-birth. And the profession of 
Art should be to the artist a re-birth, a rejuvenescence, in the 
same way as self-abnegation creates re-birth in the ascetic. The 
difference between the two is this, that the artist works passively 
and compels "matter" to obey. The ascetic works negatively 
and runs away from life and its problems. 

Re-birth, Regeneration or Reconciliation are synonymous 
terms for a life-fact which we must meet fairly and squarely, 
and a combat we must come out of victoriously. If we do not, 
we drop back into the same mud out of which we crawled 
sometime ago, and may have to live in it again. 

A powerful help to self -reconciliation is to allow our personal 
history to pass before our vision. Most people are afraid to do 
it. But that fear is a sign of an unsound mind. Let your life's 
history pass before you and you shall see ( — however desperate 
or flat your life has been — ) that there is an idea, a leading idea in 
it, and the total impression, the ensemble of your life, will illumi- 
nate you and such illumination is reconciliation or adjustment, 
harmony, properly understood. 



170 THE GREAT MOTHER 

I will not draw the picture of my soul but show a series of 
tableaux vivantes representing the earlier part of my native 
country's history and you will understand the method I suggest 
and my panorama ought to work by suggestion if not by direct 
illustration. 

When I was young, I amused myself with painting; painting 
with words, thinking that sometime I might be lucky enough to 
paint with a brush or cut with a chisel. But the painting still 
exists in words and the chisel I never handled. Let me show my 
painting. My painting is panoramic history and it works more 
by suggestion than by direct illustrations. It is a sort of tab- 
leaux vivant and is intended to show that if our life history 
passes before us as his country's history passed before the young 
man I tell about, then we shall be reconciled, or adjusted to 
ourself because then the idea, the total expression, the ensemble, 
of our life, will illuminate us and such illumination is reconcili- 
ation or adjustment, harmony, properly understood. 

My story is not in the form of a revelation of soul; it is a 
version of the history of Denmark in those regions where the 
young man saw that which I re-tell. 

On the heath near Karup, in Jutland, Denmark, lived a poor 
widow and her son. The dark gloomy heath had forced its 
stamp of melancholy upon both mother and son; but the son 
had been influenced the most. When the mother in summertime 
was away in the nearest town to work, the boy used to go out into 
the health, listening to a peculiar music that seemed to float over 
the heather tops; now feebly, now more strongly, but always as 
if coming from thousands of human voices. "What is it that sings 
around me," he asked his mother. "It is the heath," she replied 
and listened herself. You hear at once that she was attuned to 
her environment. She had the artistic genius, though she was 
only a poor working woman. "The heath?" — the boy 
replied, and wondered. Evidently something stirred in that soul. 
The heath became to him a living organism, whose breast con- 
tained both, joy and sorrow, and was able to express its soul in 
tuneful yet disconsolate song, a song attuned to his own heart 
strings. As he grew older, he thought he knew what the heath 
wanted to tell him. He was just like the other Nature-children 



THE GREAT MOTHER 17 1 

and the relationship between him and the heath became more 
intimate than that between him and his mother. Summer even- 
ings he would lie outstretched on the heather near some of the 
numerous ancient barrows, recalling to mind the lark's song dur- 
ing the day and the heat of the sun, that had tortured him, for 
the summer can be hot in Denmark. Lying thus outstretched, 
the heath seemed to be an old hermit in green-brown garment and 
playing on a harp — an old man, so old that he had seen many, 
many generations born and die. It was from such an old hermit 
in the midst of the solitude he thought the song must come. 
And his fancy was not very far astray. In the Alexander Leg- 
end the spirit of the air is often spoken of as the Green Man, 
ever young, though he seems old, because he has bathed in the 
Fountain of Youth. 

One day as he strolled aimlessly in the otherwise silent desert, 
he came upon a tumulus, that seemed open and the stone set 
grave chamber appeared visible. As he came nearer, the familiar 
tunes sounded stronger and more passionate than ever. They 
seemed to come from a place on the other side of it, which he, 
curiously enough, could not reach or even approach, try as he did. 
He stopped short, overcome by excitement and yearning; his 
dream of the old hermit seemed near realization. Taking courage 
he entered the tumulus and seemed now so near his wished- f or ob- 
ject, that all he would have to do was to push a stone away. He 
did so — and behold! before him lay in brilliant sunlight, green 
meadows, stretching as far as his eyes could reach and only 
limited by a blue sky, such as it is to be seen in Denmark. 

The vision changed and the rhythmic pulse of life that 
throbbed from the ancient mound placed him on the shore of one 
of those Vigs, so famous in History from the life of the Vig- 
Kings. He saw the "langaarede" boats return from expeditions 
on strange seas; he heard the call of Lur and saw the fair 
maidens receive the returning Bonde-warriors. When he re- 
covered his breath after the surprise, he perceived far away 
on the heath, a stone hedge around a larger stone in the mid- 
dle and on it stood on old man in a green-brown garment playing 
on a harp. The tunes from the harp, as if by magic, called 
forth from the horizon, men, dark and clothed in iron and they 
rushed at each other in fearful battle. The weight of the horses 



172 THE GREAT MOTHER 

made the soil tremble; the air whined with arrows and spears; 
swords crashed through the whirlwind; blood gushed forth to 
trumpet blasts. Thus did the old Norsemen fight and the boy 
saw the past age and event by the aid of the old man's tuneful 
harp and the magic of the heath. As the notes ebbed away, 
the combat died out and horse and foot vanished. In their place 
there now appeared a dark oaken forest and in it the boy saw 
what he called a house built of oakenstems. Around and about 
stood many stone images. In front of the house lay a flat 
stone and on it was a naked human being bound and anx- 
iously watching certain men with white beards sharpening long 
knives. But saw no more. The harp sounded again. This 
time full of yearning and charm. The stone images vanished 
and hid themselves beneath thistles and thorns. And now 
the youth saw vast masses of people gathered around a pale 
young man in a coarse garment gathered at the waist by a rope. 
He held a cross high up in his left hand and pointed with the 
right hand to the crucified figure upon it. Once again the magic 
song struck the note that changed the scenery and he saw in the 
wet mist that came up from the nearby ocean, long rows of 
priests, monks and nuns; but their incense was a stench in his 
nostrils ; their robes shame and infamy and their chanting sounded 
like hollow mockery. Wherever they went, the grass withered and 
the flowers died and the land became a desert. The tale is 
much longer, but that which I have told is enough to illustrate 
the subject. My reader's own life may be called out from ob- 
scurity like these scenes of Danish history. Such visions go to 
make reconciliations or re-births. By them Art shows the tex- 
ture of a country's history and we can see the meshes. We also 
understand the web and woof and all details fall into harmony, 
no matter how mutually contradictory they may be. "The weaver 
works on the wrong side evermore" and it is only when the 
weaving stops and the web is tossed and turned that the real 
handiwork and his marvellous skill is learned. When the web 
and woof of our life, our life in the world as well as our 
life in Art, passes in review in ordered scenes, then an inspira- 
tion is upon us ; the Inner-Life is awake and great Art is possible. 
The Great Mother has done it ! 

The philosophy of my stories and my claim that such visions 



THE GREAT MOTHER 173 

make reconciliations, is found in our image-making power. The 
images that rise spontaneously, are reflexes of ourselves and 
therefore self-revelations and re-establishments of our Inner-Life 
on an outer basis. As we see ourselves in the looking glass and 
thus get some idea of ^ourselves, so we see, even more strongly, 
ourselves reflected in our images, be they made by pen, brush or 
chisel or otherwise. These images are our saviors. Such self- 
reflections and re-establishments create either a reconciliation 
at once or send us to renewed efforts for such attainment. 

I told these stories as illustrations to show how spiritual 
events, even outside ourselves, may become our reconciliation. 
My stories raise another question. How about the evil ones? 
How about such monsters as Shakespeare's Richard III? Was 
he re-born by his acts? Let me bring out a few strong points of 
the drama and the question answers itself. Richard is a tyrant 
and a brute, but that is not his main characteristic. The key to 
his character is the consciousness with which he executes his 
tyranny and brutality. Right in the first act and first scene, 
Richard declares, that since he, on account of his deformity, 
cannot be a lover, he determines to be a villain, to be "subtle, 
false and treacherous." There can be no double meaning in 
these words, Richard is a determined man. He chooses evil de- 
liberately, not merely as an excuse because he is so ugly that 
the dogs bark at him. He will evil because it is evil, and that 
is proved by these words of his (I Act, 3rd Scene) : "I do 
the wrong; I begin the brawl; I start the mischief; I lay the 
burden therefore upon others — and then I lament and sigh and 
quote a piece of scripture — thus I clothe my naked villainy." 
Richard succeeded. Act III, scene vii shows the results. Clar- 
ence has been murdered; Edward is dead; the young princes 
confined in the tower; Rivers, Grey and Vaughan, even the 
noble soul, Hastings, have all been executed. Richard did it all. 
— At this stage began the juggling to make the people of Lon- 
don call him to the throne and that meant again more villainy 
and Richard again gained his point and by means of Bucking- 
ham and more villainy. Richard even calls himself the Lord's 
Anointed. 

Thus Shakespeare has clearly pointed to Richard as rooted in 



174 the; great mother 

evil, as acting evil deliberately and as a self-conscious villain, 
who even glories in his villainy. 

According to my reasoning before, simple logic would say 
that Richard's case is parallel to reconciliation as I defined it 
and called it the process of at-one-ment of inner and outer. Is 
Richard truly reconciled to himself and is he an Art product of 
Beauty. Is reconciliation possible in evil? The answer is easily 
given and is No ! Richard is not at peace : Peace or Inner-Life 
are the main characteristics of reconciliation or re-birth. Rich- 
ard gives proof of not being at peace with himself. He passes 
three unhappy and sad women, queen Margaret, the widow of 
Henry VI, the duchess, his mother and Elizabeth, queen to 
Edward IV. For the moment they forget their mutual hatred 
and like three furies burst forth in wild words and curses. 
And Richard's conscience rises at the same time. B^utjiewill^ 
not hear and orders the drums, to be beaten. That proves that 
Richard is not at peace with himself and therefore not recon- 
ciled. Finally, the scene on Bosworth field settles the question 
without doubt, that the work which makes for reconciliation or 
re-birth for the artist must conform to all that which is positive 
in life; to that which bears forward; which has the power of 
the infinite in it. No union is a union unless Inner and Outer 
are harmonized in it and the net result is peace, bliss and that 
Freedom which lifts us into the immortal life. Such reconcilia- 
tion is not troubled like Richard on Bosworth heath with ghosts 
which come "to sit heavy upon his soul." Such reconciliation 
does not cry out — "A horse ! a horse ! my kingdom for a horse !" 

Nature or the Great Mother shows how she reconciles or 
straightens out temporary disturbances and disorders or that 
which we in human life call evils and sins. Notice how often 
she clears the atmosphere in summer at about 7 p. m. in New 
York City for instance, on days when the heat has been un- 
bearable and the moisture has nearly washed out all our vitality. 
Suddenly the city experiences a violent thunder storm, and im- 
mediately after, the air is clear, breathing is easy, life restored 
and hopes revivified. We recover ourselves and became recon- 
ciled. That is Nature's method and she is right, because recon- 
ciliation means restoration to order of disturbed factors; such 
a re-arrangement which makes a new life possible. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 175 

The same process can be seen in the hills and valleys at the 
time of a severe and sudden rainfall. The rain rushes down all 
hill sides with so much impetus that it carries with it large 
quantities of soil and debris and these fill the streams and make 
them muddy, entirely, disturbing the water courses both as re- 
gards size and color and general flow. But soon, very soon, 
after the storm, the mud sinks to the bottom and next day the 
stream is clear again. This is, as I said, another illustration of 
the same fact. Nature's demonstration of reconciliation or 
way of straightening out difficulties and perversions and re- 
storing normal conditions. In human society the same process 
can be seen if looked for. There are numerous people among 
us who, in their youth, not only sewed wild oats, but really com- 
mitted crimes and protected by circumstances, escaped detec- 
tion. That protection is a form of that leveling process which 
is going on all the time and which bridges over crimes or of- 
fences, which if discovered and examined, would have made 
a happy future impossible for those involved. 

When I said that circumstances protected and neutralized 
many an error and crime, I meant to say that life holds an 
element, a power, which acts as a redeemer and reconciler by 
removing sins and trespasses and leaving numerous people free- 
dom to live without paying the penalty of their sins and tres- 
passes. This fact ( — for it is a fact — ) proves that there is 
reconciliation or at-one-ment woven into the texture of life. 
It proves that at-one-ment is an inherent fact, and that there 
always is an at-one-ment and that it is an eternal fact. 

Notice how Nature operates with mud and refuse and does 
away with sin. Our cities empty their sewers into rivers or 
into the ocean. And what does the ocean do? It re-assorts all 
that refuse and builds up new continents which in due time rise 
to the surface full of new and rich possibilities of life. If that 
is not reconciliation, what then is reconciliation? Is it not re- 
demption ? Is it not a re-birth ? Is it not a supreme Art ? Who 
can deny it? Glory to the Great Mother! 

Those who have crossed the ocean must have noticed how 
the steamer traces a line in the waters ; it is clear and distinctly 
cut and can be seen for a mile or more behind the ship. In 
the wake of the ship and along that line, floats all that refuse 



V 



1^6 THE GREAT MOTHER 

which is cast overboard. Sea birds, gulls, sharks, etc., follow 
in it and eat the stuff. Like that line in the ocean, are all those 
debased, insincere and immature thoughts and acts which a 
progressive life leaves behind and sinks into the stream of a 
dark river, which, like a sewer, runs through human society. 
Crude thoughts and raw acts leave scars, deep and long, behind 
them, but the waters of life close over them. A healthy life 
is not injured. Thus Nature and Life make reconciliation. 
Theirs is an Art far more potent than official religion. It makes 
no fuss about it and demands no pay for the reconciliatory 
ceremony. 

Someone has talked about sermons in stones and talked well. 
Stones do preach and we may open to any book written by Na- 
ture or Life or the Art whose wisdom is not of the schools, and 
on the first page we read about life and hope, all in brilliant 
letters of youth. On the next page, you read about change, de- 
cay and death and the page groans with sorrows and lamenta- 
tions, but if we listen very closely to the modulations of the 
voices, we hear undertones of hope again and rejoicings of 
life abundant, and before we have turned to the third page, we 
have already heard its lesson about redemption and reconcilia- 
tion because the letters on the second page have transmuted 
themselves like the dissolving views of the camera. The three 
pages all spell reconciliation, Nature's and Life's method of 
creating Freedom. All this is Inner-Life, the Eternal Gospel of 
the Great Mother. 

Not only do stones cry out and teach re-birth, but any survey 
of the history of Art gives the same result. 

Something like this I have read in Michael Angel o^s Aurora. 
She reads like the third page of the book I just referred to. 
She is the awakened human spirit, the resurrected soul of Art 
out of the tomb of emaciated and saintly medieval sculpture. 
In her once again Art comes to its own after death and decay. 
She is reconciliation. In her rich and self-resting figure, Art 
reveals that Freedom which is born of Night and Night's strug- 
gles with meanness and brutality. 

In conclusion I claim that I have now shown Art and Religion 
to be correlated energies. In physics we speak of correlation of 



THB GREAT MOTHER 177 

energies and mean that the various forms of energy are so inti- 
mately related in the grand system of Nature, that they may pass 
into all the others. In the same way I have shown that in the 
psychic world, Art and Religion may pass into each other or take 
each others place and they may do so because they are forms of 
the fundamental thought-energy. 

I have now spoken of that miraculous fact called Reconcilia- 
tion, such as Nature shows it and such as it is seen in human 
life in general. And no one can deny that it is a most important 
factor in the Inner-Life, whether it be Nature's life or that of 
Humanity, or that of Art. There are two more features of this 
wonder to be described and they may be seen in the Inner-Life 
of artists. The first of these two corresponds to the subject of 
my first chapter which was Art as Energy. The corresponding 
artistic life is that of Freedom. The second of the two corre- 
sponds to the subject of my second chapter, which was Art as 
expressed by lines, light and form. The corresponding artistic 
life is that which expresses itself in ecstasy and poetic-prophetic 
work. 

The first of these two I will now speak about, namely, the 
artist's life of Freedom and how Freedom arises in reconcilia- 
tion. 

When I speak about Freedom I want it to be understood, 
that Freedom does not mean liberty or license ; it has no political, 
social or moral signification. It means — and that is its best and 
true signification — the Inner-Life, the Presence. The Inner- 
Life is Freedom because it is untrammeled and resting in itself. 
A life resting in itself is free. That is the correct conception 
of Freedom and the true use of the term, though the majority of 
people are ignorant of it. Those who have a knowledge of the 
Inner-Life know the truth of that which I say and are accus- 
tomed to use the term Freedom as the best term known for a 
characterization of the Inner-Life. 

Artists, pre-eminently, have the advantage of living in Free- 
dom and they have always claimed to be free and untrammeled 
— at least in theory. Artists may be free because of their devo- 
tion to Beauty, because Beauty is its own justification and 
centre. Neither the Good nor the True are founded in them- 



\/ 



178 THE GREAT MOTHER 

selves like Beauty is. They express something not themselves. 
Beauty is expressing itself and nothing else. It is Presence. 

Because Beauty is such and because artists worship Beauty, 
they are typical men of Freedom; they do not measure them- 
selves or their work according to another's yard stick or balance ; 
they are not cut after a pattern made by others. 

We can always test an artist and readily find out whether he 
or she is free. The test is this. The soul is like a bird that only 
sings when it is free. If an artist does not create or sing out 
the soul into work, he or she is not free. 

Mountain roads leading through the forest have great fas- 
cinating powers because they lead somewhere and they suggest 
the question: What is there yonder? So with some words. 
Freedom for instance. There is a perspective in it, and the 
one who is in Freedom can focalize his or her views. But to 
focalize and to get perspective involves reconciliation or adjust- 
ment. The close relationship between reconciliation and Free- 
dom and how they condition each other is thus seen. 

Freedom thus understood, has the power to interpret the 
mysteries of creation and to interpret them in tones or colors 
or lines. Freedom is the Inner-Life and Art and the true and 
heavenly atmosphere of the artists. It is their fountain of 
youth and the power that reconciles them and their work and 
the world. Artists may be poor. Freedom is not necessarily 
the same as a full purse, but it is always, immortality. It is 
only to the free man that mountains become sermons, and the 
lilies smile. And why? Because they are all reconciled and 
rooted in self-realization. Only in Freedom can an artist feel 
what it is to be personally related to Nature or the Great Mother 
and take a sacramental view of the activities of the daily life. 
Only in Freedom are artists able to clothe a far reaching thought 
in a garment that makes it very present to sense. 

For these reasons artists should cultivate Freedom as much 
and perhaps more than technique. 

There is still one more feature of reconciliation to be defined. 
That feature which in the artist's life corresponds to lines, light 
and form in objective Art is the artist's ecstatic conditions and 
poetic-prophetic work or, in other words, the conditions in which 
artists transcend themselves. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 179 

I have once, somewhere else, said that over the New Testa- 
ment might be written "I am the resurrection and the life" be- 
cause these words are the poetry or the deepest sense of all its 
narratives. And the refrain of all its verses is "O death, where is 
thy sting?" The same words could in full truth be written over 
the studios of real artists such as for instance, Michael Angelo 
and Raphael to mention only two. Whatever the great artist 
produces becomes a living influence because he or she works in 
rejuvenescences, transfigurations and ascensions. He or she re- 
tains his or her rational mind in the midst of his or her ecsta- 
cies, yet allows the higher impulses to dictate the work that is to 
be done. He or she is freed and is a living channel of himself 
or herself in it all : a Child of Art, the Child of the Great Mother. 



Ill 

THE RELIGIOUS MYSTERY 

OF 

THE GREAT MOTHER 

Which is the true God ? The God of the cities or the God of the deserts ? 
To which to go ? — Maurice de Guh'in. 



V 



1 82 the great mother 

Invocation 

Mother Divine! Supreme Ineffable! No more we fear Thee 
for Thou art Love ! In this holier moment of silence we ask that 
Thy immortal flame shall stir our hearers with sacred desires, and 
animate our minds with new understandings of Thy word and 
works. On our soul's eternal pathway gleam forth Thy Light 
as in the primal day of our journey, and bring us more into the 
full power of Thy perfect Whole ! In the past Thou hast guided 
our souls across the dark threshold of our being, accepting lov- 
ingly all our errors and strifes and perplexities. We have noth- 
ing apart from Thee for Thou art in us, and we in Thee. In 
the profound joy of this boundless Self we desire a closer 
fellowship of Thine Omnipresence and ask that our message may 
be sanctified, nurtured, and blessed, bringing to us grander ex- 
pressions of Thy Love, Harmony and Glory.* 

Religion and Revelation 

A relationship to the Divine may be one of contrast between 
the world and the Divine, between Man and the Divine. It may 
also contain the mediation between these opposites. In a sum 
total: religion is a life in God, whatever the understanding be 
of God. Religion is pre-eminently Man's reaching out after the 
Divine. Revelation is the approach of the Divine to Man, what- 
ever be the form of that approach and its purpose. Revelation 
presupposes Religion and Religion reaches its highest in Reve- 
lation. The two are thus distinct, as it would seem. But it may 
be asserted that religion is ultimately revelation and that there 
can be no Revelation without religion. In this book the main 
tendency is towards religion such as Nature, conceived as Person- 
ality, would teach and has taught Man. The main thesis is that 
back of all religions, especially those of a masculine character, 
lies the conception of Femininity as the Cause and End of all 
things, and, Femininity is seen where Nature is spoken of. It 
has been my endeavor to collect and arrange enough illustrations 
to prove that Nature as a term stands for that Great Power, 
which I have called the Great Mother and which ought to be 
called so and which was called so in antiquity. 

* The Threshold I*amp, June 1899. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 1 83 

Nature Mysticism and the Great Mother 

This chapter is to be devoted to 

"What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal." 

The thought is in the last line of Byron's stanza : 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, 

There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 

There is society where none intrudes 

By the deep sea, and music in its roar ; 

I love not man the less, but Nature more 

From these our interviews, in which I steal 

From all I may be or have been before, 

To mingle with the universe and feel 

What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. 

Nature-Mysticism is an understanding of the phenom- 
ena of Nature in their mystical and occult aspects, and, an un- 
derstanding and realization of that connection between us and 
Nature which creates a feeling of family likeness. The aspects 
are numerous, but they all minister to us and approach us as 
beauty, love, wisdom and union. To Nature-Mysticism, Nature 
is a Living Presence or as I say the Great Mother. Nature- 
Mysticism arises for everyone of us if we live in the Open and 
allow its life to affect us. It is true that life in the Open has 
created mythology and many superstitions in the past, but that 
does not militate against a renewed devotion in modern days. 
With a deeper understanding of ourselves and more rational 
views of physical phenomena we may safely return to the Un- 
known God, the Great Mother. Mankind has lost its best relig- 
ious teacher and the ministry of Beauty by forgetting the Great 
Mother and only seeing her actions as physical phenomena. 
There are only few disciples at Sais in our day, but they are be- 
ginning to realize the value of the alphabet used in the Bible 
of Nature and can therefore read a little here and there. It is 
from such initiates that I have learned 

"What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal." 



184 the; great mother 

Nature-Mysticism means the realization of a conscious uni- 
verse. "Matter" is the expression of consciousness. The mo- 
ment we perceive this, all barriers of space and time fall down 
and the soul finds an inheritance of immortality in spiritual exist- 
ence. Nature-Mysticism speaks about a soul in Nature and 
also says that Nature is soul. A stone lying by the roadside ap- 
pears to be a dead thing and to assign to it an active existence 
seems absurd. Yet Mystics enfold it and place it on their 
genealogy, because they all come from the same Great Mother. 
They do the same with flowers, trees, clouds and all other 
things. The sparrow and the blackberry; a tuft of grass and a 
clot of earth are better teachers than Plato and the Academy. 

"What tho' no charms my person grace 
Nor beauty moulds my form, nor paints my face? 
Thou seest a present God-like power 
Imprinted in each herb and flower." 

This is a mystery to some, but not to him or her who has that 
intuition and sense perception which sees the Absolute every- 
where and the love that enfolds Man and Nature in the same liv- 
ing garment. To him and her existence is an expression either 
of an immanent idea or of the Great Mother's life. In either 
case they are Nature-Mystics, whether called so or not. Only 
stupidity or religious bias denies the universal consciousness. 
As Josiah Royce* has said: "We have no right whatsoever to 
speak of really unconscious Nature, but only of uncommunicative 
Nature, or of Nature whose mental processes go on at such 
different time-rates from ours, that we can not adjust ourselves 
to a live appreciation." Men like Wordsworth who lived in the 
Open could truly say and correctly interpret Nature when he 
exclaimed 

'Tis my faith that every flower 

Enjoys the air it breathes. 

And Emerson had guessed the mystery, though not himself a 
Nature-Mystic 

The sun himself shines heartily 

And shares the joy he brings. 

* The World and the Individual. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 1 85 

The Senses 

But there will be no Nature-Mysticism till we rehabilitate the 
senses and learn to value them as the normal keys to our sur- 
rounding world, the infra and the supra world. Will my read- 
er drop his or her notions about the senses if those notions are 
of an antagonistic nature. I can not spend time and space upon 
an argument against them. I want to maintain that for the nor- 
mal man sensation is a mode of consciousness which can not be 
dispensed with. Through the senses as we call our apparatus 
of perception, we receive a stimulus from the external world 
which we can not do without. This ordinary sensation is as im- 
portant and necessary for our life, spiritual and otherwise, as 
that which the Mystics call the Spiritual Sense, or our ability 
and means for the apprehension of spiritual truth immediately. 

It must be maintained that the senses must be developed and 
trained before Nature's mysteries can be discovered and appreci- 
ated. Not only do the present day people live in ignorance of 
the value of their senses, but they have been trained in the idea 
that they are perverted and totally sinful. The truth is that our 
sense-life is very incomplete and largely an undiscovered field of 
activity. The senses must be rediscovered as the doorways into 
Nature's mysteries and not merely used as tools for the material 
necessities of daily life. The subtle and pervasive forces of Na- 
ture can not enter us except by the senses. The senses are the 
smelting pots in which the subtle and pervasive forces are trans- 
mitted into human conceptions. And the senses are the guides 
and hands and feet by which we enter into the wonderland of 
life-forces, Beauty mysteries and divine Presences. 

We must discover the world ourselves and only that part of 
the world which we discover for ourselves can we take possession 
of. The senses are the discoverers and the first map makers 
and pioneers. 

The Mystical Side of Nature 

I wrote as a heading for this chapter: the mystical side of 
Nature ; I might just as well have written : Nature, a Mystery, 
because she is a mystery. That great spectacle which our senses 
observe, has been a wonder from the earliest days and still is 
even to those who pretend to ignore it and place their own mind 



1 86 THE GREAT MOTHER 

above it and whose criticism is merely fault finding. Our in- 
tuitions are, however, justified by science and our emotions re- 
spond to discovered facts. Tyndall worked best when in the tem- 
per of the poet, and his best works on light and radiant heat 
were produced in a kind of spiritual exaltation. Sunsets, thun- 
derbolts and ecstasy were no strangers to him. 

Nature-Mysticism is not a metaphysical subject or question, 
but an attitude to the Great Fact of Life. The first requisite 
for a view of the mystical side of Nature is expressed by Julian, 
the Apostate (Orat. iv. 148) as follows: "Do not view and con- 
template the heaven and the world with the same eyes that oxen 
and horses do, but so, as from that which is visible to the out- 
ward senses, to discern and discover another invisible nature un- 
der it." The rule is so simple that it seems unnecessary to 
mention it. However, St. Paul has also said something like it 
and supplementing the above, namely (Rom. 1.20). "The invisible 
things of Him (God) from the creation of the world are clearly 
seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His 
eternal power and godhead." And the "eternal power and good- 
ness" is the main key to that which the religious eye sees. 

What Nature Can Do for Us 

Basil the Great held that "the contemplation of Nature abates 
the fever of the soul and banishes all insincerity and presump- 
tion" and he praised solitude "happy he who leads a lonely life. 
Happy he who with the mighty force of a pure mind sees the 
glory of the light of heaven." St. Augustine looked upon his own 
heart as a sick child and sought healing for it in Nature and 
solitude. Schiller advises us to go to Nature: 

Oh, Nature is perfect wherever we stray, 
'Tis man that deforms it with care. 

But it must be stated at once, that it is only to the fully developed 
man that Nature discloses herself entirely on the mystical side. 
Further, to find the key to the mysteries let us go to Jacob 
Bohme, a Nature-Mystic of the first order. The key to a true 
understanding of Nature, I take from his Aurora: 



THE GREAT MOTHER 187 

God is the heart or source of Nature. 
Nature is the body of God. 

""Creation is nothing else than a revelation of the all-pervad- 
ing godhead and is like the music of many flutes combined into 
one great harmony." 

Nature, A Bible, Not Falsified and Spoiled 

Raymund of Sabunde told us so: "God has given us two 
books: the book of all living beings, or Nature, and the Holy 
Scriptures. The first was given to Man from the Beginning 
when all things were created, for each living being is but a let- 
ter of an alphabet written by the finger of God, and the book is 
composed of them all together as a book of letters. Man is the 
capital letter of this book. This book is not like the other 
falsified and spoiled, but familiar and intelligible; it makes man 
joyous and humble and obedient, a hater of evil and a lover of 
virtue." But no one can read either of the books except in the 
simplicity of heart. St. Francis can teach the right method. 
J. G. Sulzer (Unterredungen iiber die Schonheit der Natur — ) : 
"To delight in Nature the mind must be free — She is a sanc- 
tity only approached by pure souls — it is only on quiet souls 
that Nature's pictures are painted — Nature is rays from that 
source of all Beauty, the sight of which will one day bless the 
soul." 

St. Francis 

St. Francis* knew well enough the distance between God, 
Man and Nature and never mixed his notions relating to them. 
And his intense godliness never prevented him from being a 
friend of Nature. He felt no fear of her as most others did in 
his age. He cultivated intimacy and Nature in turn gave him 
wings for his piety. 

St. Bonaventura recorded this saying of St. Francis about all 
creatures: "They have the same principle as we. Like us they 
have life, thought, choice and love of the Creator." As a result 
of this view he spoke to the animals, water, etc., as brothers and 



r 



* Com p. Abbe Leon Le Monnier: History of St. Francis of Assisi. London, 1894, 
Chapter xx. 




l88 THE GREAT MOTHER 

sisters. His intention was to convey the idea of his union 
with the great source of all things. We have heard in our own 
day and marvelled at Buddha's and Buddhist's care not to 
trample upon the small creeps of the earth. St. Francis did the 
same and in the same spirit of brotherhood. He would carry a 
worm to the side of the road, lest it be crushed. "O simple 
piety; O pious simplicity," exclaimed Celano. When the breth- 
ren went to the forest to cut wood he recommended them not 
to hurt the roots, so that the tree might have another chance 
for life, by sprouting again. He could not see a bed of flowers 
without being enchanted and inviting them to praise their Creator. 
The heavenly bodies, sun, moon and stars, were to him the 
clearest revelations of Infinite Beauty and they seemed to him 
to cry out: "He, who made us is very good." All creation was 
in his eyes a divine poem in which the Creator had written 
something about Himself. To read that "something" required 
a pure heart, St. Francis always told his disciples. Because the 
Lord has said "I am the light of the world," St. Francis con- 
sidered all lights — candles, torches, lamps — as symbols and he 
looked upon their brilliancy with religious joy. Legends tell 
how Nature repaid the saint. Brilliant lights suddenly appeared 
to guide him on his road. Fire moderated its heat to spare him 
pain in a surgical operation. Water was changed into wine for 
his benefit when he was ill at the hermitage St. Urbano. Wild 
animals laid down their ferocity. Grasshoppers learned from 
him to sing the praise of the Lord. A certain wolf in the 
country around the city of Gubbio obeyed St. Francis and lay 
down at his feet and after that ceased to attack anybody and 
entered upon an agreement with the people not to hurt them if 
they would feed him thereafter. The agreement lasted till the 
wolf died. 

Thus far the legends. Is there any truth back of these tales? 
His historians explain that the saint had recovered original in- 
nocence and thus gained the sovereignty which is the right of the 
head of creation: Man. And they are right. When a man 
comes into perfect harmony with himself and peace with the 
fundamental principle of life, life can not hurt him. Life, viz., 
wild animals, etc., are confusion and enmity but when not roused, 
do not attack. 



THtf GREAT MOTHER 189 

The "Canticle of the Sun" or rather "Praises of the Crea- 
tures," by St. Francis:* 

Most High, omnipotent, good Lord, 
Praise, glory and honor and benediction all, are Thine. 
To three alone do they belong, most High, 
And there is no man fit to mention Thee. 

Praise be to Thee, my Lord, with all Thy creatures, 

Especially to my worshipful brother sun, 

The which lights up the day, and through him dost Thou 

brightness give; 
And beautiful is he and radiant with splendor great; 
Of Thee, most High, signification gives. 

Praised be my Lord, for sister moon and for the stars, 
In heaven Thou hast formed them clear and precious and 

fair. 
Praised be my Lord for brother wind 
And for the air and clouds and fair and every kind of 

weather, 
By the which Thou givest to Thy creatures nourishment. 

Praised be my Lord for sister water, 

The which is greatly helpful and humble and precious and 

pure. 
Praised be my Lord for brother fire, 
By the which Thou lightest up the dark. 
And fair is he and gay and mighty and strong. 

Praised by my Lord for our sister, mother earth, 

The which sustains and keeps us 

And brings forth divers fruits with grass and flowers 

bright. 
Praised be my Lord for those who for Thy love forgive 
And weakness bear and tribulation. 
Blessed those who shall in peace endure, 
For by Thee, most High, shall they be crowned. 



* The Writings of St. Francis of Assisi. By Father Paschal Robinson, Phila. 1906, 
p. 152. 



190 the; great mother 

Praised be my Lord for our sister, the bodily death, 

From the which no living man can flee. 

Woe to them who die in mortal sin; 

Blessed those who shall find themselves in Thy most holy 

will, 
For the second death shall do them no ill. 

Praise ye and bless ye my Lord, and give Him thanks, 
And be subject unto Him with great humility. 

About this poem Ozanam said: "In it we feel the breath of 
that great Umbrian terrestrial paradise where the sky is so 
brilliant and the earth so laden with flowers."* He also said "its 
language has all the simplicity and a nascent idiom, the rhythm 
and all the inexperience of unstudied poetry that easily satisfies 
unlearned hearers." 

Still another genius would I quote as having a key to Nature. 
He is St. Bonaventura, who counted the smallest creatures his 
brothers and sisters and called upon crops, vineyards, trees, flow- 
ers and stars to praise God. In this he followed his master, 
St. Francis. To the same group of witnesses belongs Hugo St. 
Victor, who also held as did Bernard of Clairvaux that all nat- 
ural objects are "rays of the Godhead" and said for himself: 
"the whole visible world is like a book written by the finger of 
God. It is created by divine power, and all human beings are 
fingers placed in it, not to show the free-will of man, but as a 
revelation and visible sign, by divine will, of God's invisible 
wisdom. But as one who only glances at an open book sees 
marks on it, but does not read the letters, so the wicked and 
sensual man, in whom the spirit of God is not, sees only the 
outer surface of visible beings and not their deeper parts." 
Also Vincentius of Beauvais who in his Speculum naturae dem- 
onstrated the value of studying Nature from a religious and 
moral point of view ; and Dionysius of Rickel who said that "all 
the beauty of the animal world is nothing but the reflection and 
outflow of the original Beauty of God." Another inspired man 
I refer to as a safe guide to wisdom of Nature. He is Giordano 



* Poetes Franciscains p. 74. Quoted by I<e Monnier in his I<ife of Francis of Assisi. 



THB GREAT MOTHER 191 

Bruno. Bruno saw Nature in development: matter, soul and 
mind, and had a clear eye for all Nature's stages and phases 
as revelations of the One. The following may serve as a sum- 
mary of his insight: 

* 
The material of all things issues from the original womb, 
For Nature works with a master hand in her own inner 

depths ; 
She is art, alive and gifted with a splendid mind, 
Which fashions its own material, not that of others, 
And does not falter or doubt, but all by itself 
Lightly and surely, as fire burns and sparkles, 
Easily and widely, as light spreads everywhere, 
Never scattering its forces, but stable, quiet, and at one, 
Orders and disposes of everything together. 

For short, Nature is a personal factor and most mystical. 

Does Nature-Knowledge Confuse ? 

Gregorio Lopez, a man who had studied many sides of Na- 
ture when asked if such knowledge confused him, answered: 
"I find God in all things, great and small." The answer ought to 
confound all hypocrites and pietists. The richer a man's mental 
endowment is and the more individual his feelings, the more he 
can see in Nature and the deeper he sees into her Wisdom 
sources. 

Romanticism and Communion with Nature 

If one seeks to find the Great Secret or longs for the Com- 
pelling Vision, he shall not get it from the commonplace sur- 
roundings of his everyday life, such as worldliness and vanity 
have made it. Let him seek the romantic lovers of Nature, those 
who commune with the God of the Open. They only have the 
inspiration of existence; they only see things in the light of 
ideas. They only have met the Mother-God, because she 
sought them out and revealed her secret in the forest-cathedrals, 
in the vast expanse of the desert and such places which she 
reserves for those who are children of the Spirit. Deity is no 
doubt present in the Common, but not in the Commonplace. 



192 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Noise and selfishness drive the mystery away. The ground and 
the road are romantic to a passionate mind, but an automobile 
ride drives away their vistas and silences. The sky and the sea 
are common enough, but they are not commonplace or mean- 
ingless to one animated with symbolism. It is the romantic vein 
that gives zest and enthusiasm to the Nature-lover, because it 
sees Divinity everywhere and feels a hand reached out from 
every bush for a greeting and finds itself under the vigilance of 
the eternal eye. The romantic mind enters the company of 
Nature with an uncommon affection and with knowledge that 
penetrates to the core of things. It sees the Whole in all parts 
and nothing isolated, but all things interpenetrated with all other 
things. It finds mind everywhere and communes with it. 

Family Relationship with Nature 

Chateaubriand said in his "Genie du Christianisme" : "The 
true God, in entering into His Works, has given His immensity 
to Nature — there is an instinct in man, which puts him in com- 
munication with the scenes of Nature." Byron expressed the 
family-likeness still more emphatically in Childe Harold: 

Are not the mountains, waves and skies a part 
Of me and of my soul, as I of them? 

Call this feeling of Byron's a pantheistic sympathy — well, what of 
it? What are words worth? Byron lived, he did not merely 
think these verses. I think he saw the Great Mother, as did 
Chateaubriand. Chateaubriand made his Rene exclaim : "It was 
not God whom I contemplated on the waves in the magnificence 
of His works : I saw an unknown woman, and the miracle of His 
smile, the beauties of the sky, seemed to me disclosed by her 
breath. I would have bartered eternity for one of her caresses. 
I pictured her to myself as throbbing behind this veil of the uni- 
verse which hid her from my eyes. Oh ! why was it not in my 
power to rend the veil and press the idealized woman to my 
heart, to spend myself on her bosom with the love which is the 
source of my inspiration, my despair, and my life ?" 

Tieck called Nature a mysterious poem, a dreaming mind. 
Novalis took up the idea and worked it out. 



2 



THE GREAT MOTHER 193 

Nature, Love, Yearning and Sympathy 

In his "essay on love" Shelley speaks of the irresistible long- 
ing for sympathy of the human heart and how Nature at that 
time sympathizes with us. "In solitude, or in that deserted state 
when we are surrounded by human beings, and yet they sympa- 
thize not with us, we love the flowers, the grass, and the water 
and the sky. In the motion of the very leaves of spring, in the 
blue air, there is then found a sweet correspondence with our 
heart. There is eloquence in the tongueless wind, and the melody 
in the flowing brooks and the rustling of the reeds beside them, 
which, by their inconceivable relation to something within the 
soul, awaken the spirits to a dance of breathless rapture, and 
bring tears of mysterious tenderness to the eyes, like the voice 
of one beloved singing to you alone." And this is his "Love of 
Nature" 

I love all thou lovest, 

Spirit of Delight; 

The fresh earth in new leaves dressed, 

And the starry night, 

Autumn evening and the morn 

When the golden mists are born. 

I love snow and all the forms 

Of the radiant frost; 

I love waves and wind and storms — 

Everything almost 

Which is Nature's, and may be 

Untainted by man's misery. 

Nature, A Comforter and Liberator 

Jean Paul (Richter) seems to have felt Nature as a Comforter 
and emancipator. In his Titan he expresses this thought : "Ex- 
alted Nature ! When we see and love thee, we love our fellow- 
men more warmly, and when we must pity or forget them, thou 
still remainest with us, reposing before the moist eye like a ver- 
dant chain of mountains in the evening red. Ah ! before the soul 
in whose sight the morning dew of its ideals has faded to a cold, 
grey drizzle — thou remainest, quickening Nature, with thy 
flowers and mountains and cataracts, a faithful Comforter." 



194 TH£ GR£AT MOTHER 

A prayer to Nature by Frederich Stolberg : 

Holy Nature, heavenly fair, 
Lead us with thy parent care; 
In thy footsteps let us tread 
As a willing child is led. 
When with care and grief opprest, 
Soft I sink me on thy breast ; 
On thy peaceful bosom laid, 
Grief shall cease, nor care invade. 
O congenial power divine, 
All my votive soul is thine. 
I Lead me with thy parent care, 

Holy Nature, heavenly fair! 

It is clear from Goethe's axioms and enthusiasm, that Nature 
is both ever-changing and ever-constant and that though she 
deals with us very much as it seems, according to her own pleas- 
ure, we can nevertheless not do without her. Our whole exist- 
ence, depends upon her. Do we know Nature ? Is it a fact that 
we read into Nature that which she is? Or is it as Pythagoras 
said "like is only understood by like," and, that our knowledge 
of Nature is true knowledge because Nature, being reflected in 
our mind, is seen correctly by us, because our mind is like Na- 
ture? Our mind could not have reflected Nature if the two were 
not alike. We resemble that mind which we understand and, 
we understand only that which resembles us. Common obser- 
vation confirms Goethe's notion (in Jahresseiten and in the 
Aphorisms) "We know of no world except in relation to man; 
we desire no Art but that which is the expression of this re- 
lation." "Look into yourself and you will find everything, and 
rejoice if outside yourself, as you may say, lies a nature which 
says yea and amen to all that you have found there." Ruckert is 
of the same opinion : "the charm of a landscape lies in this, that 
it seems to reflect back that part of one's inner life, of mind, 
mood, and feeling, which we have given it." Ebers chimes in 
with the same song: "lay down your best of heart and mind be- 
fore eternal Nature ; she will repay you a thousandfold, with full 
hands." At Brunnen, Goethe wrote about a scene over which 
he felt "the formless greatness of Nature." 



THE GREAT MOTHER 195 

Nature and Art 

Durer's judgment is so valuable, because his respect for Na- 
ture was so deep. In his work on proportion, he wrote: "Cer- 
tainly Art is hid in Nature, and he who is able to separate it by 
force from Nature, possesses it. Never imagine that you can or 
will surpass Nature's achievements; human effort can not com- 
pare with the ability which her creator has given her. There- 
fore no man can ever make a picture which excels Nature's; 
and when, through much copying, he has seized her spirit, it 
can not be called original work, it is rather something received 
and learnt, whose seeds grow and bear fruit of their own kind. 
Thereby the gathered treasure of the heart, and the new crea- 
ture which takes shape and form there, comes to light in the 
artist's work." 

The Great Mother Loves Fourfoldness 

"Nature chooses the four-square because, length and breadth 
being equal, the figure has a fullness and completeness that other 
wise could not be attained. Man has developed the body after 
a square, both in shape and in temperamental disposition, and can- 
not change it. Mentally, mankind thinks in a square before it 
builds a house. Nature delights in fourfoldness, though she does 
not always fling a square measure in our face. Her four-square 
is not necessarily a geometric figure. Her geometry and arithme- 
tic sometimes read differently from ours. Those who have been 
through her school have learned that i plus i is equal to I and 
not to two, as others say, See the mystery? 

"In connection with these facts, there is also another law which 
compels us; it is a law which a chemist knows in a most em- 
phatic form. Ask him and he will speak of the law of definite 
proportions, and as an illustration he may use the following. He 
may tell us that if we mix 23 ounces of sodium with 35.5 ounces 
of chlorine we will obtain common salt. But, says he, if our 
.5 of sodium be the quantity of chlorine, Nature will not mix 
that .5 of sodium, but will quietly put that extra quantity of 
sodium aside, and the rest will all unite. And he will emphasize 
the fact that we cannot in any way coax or compel Nature to 
mix that .5. In the mixing, Nature is exclusive. This one il- 



196 the; great mother 

lustration is enough. Such is the law. Nature is very precise 
and has her way of doing things, and nothing can change her 
way. 'The life of God is mathematic,' said Novalis, and all 
Nature-lovers say so, too. 

"The law of fourfoldness is absolute so long as we live a 
natural life. We cannot change it and retain a natural life. We 
may deny the law altogether and attempt to overcome it and 
strive for a life above and freyond the natural law. That is true. 
And that striving is called self-denial and the method is called the 
Path."* 

In the Garden of Eden there was a "river that went out of 
Eden to water the. Garden" and "it was divided into four heads." 
That river is the divine life-current, flowing from a specially pro- 
tected center of the universe. It is divided into four vitalizing 
streams: "one flowing into the surface of so-called inorganic 
nature; one into the vegetable creation; one into the inferior 
animal creation and one into man." Also by colors of quality is 
the square described in the Kabbalah (Mather's Kabbalah, page, 
336) : "But whensoever the colors are mingled together then he 
is called Tiphereth, and the whole body is formed into a tree (the 
Autz Ha-Chaiim or tree of life), great and strong, fair and 
beautiful." As for the colors such as the Kabbalah designated 
them: great — strong — fair — beautiful, they are rather qualities, 
potencies and faculties, etc., than colors such as we ordinarily 
think of color. The color of "great" is yellow ; that of Strong" is 
blue; that of "fair" is pink and that of "beautiful" is white. 
Pythagoras (according to Plutarch, Morals vol. 3, page 109 tr.) 
declared the nature of number rests in ten; but if we regard 
its power, in the four. Therefore the most sacied oath is by 
the quarternary: 

"By th' founder of the sacred number s four, 
Eternal Nature's font and root, they swore." 

"Of that number the soul of man is composed : for mind, knowl- 
edge, opinion and sense are the four that complete the soul, from 
which all sciences, all arts, all rational faculties derive them- 
selves." 



* Compare my article hi The Word, November, 1911. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 197 

In his commentaries on the Golden Verses of Pythagoras Hier- 
ocles says: "He (Pythagoras) enters into the very foundation of 
theology and manifestedly demonstrates that the Quaternion, 
or the Number of Four which is the source of the Eternal Order 
of the world, is nothing else than the Divinity, which created all 
things." Empedocles, the Agrigentine, also affirmed the four 
elements 

Mark the four roots of all created things : — 
Bright shining Jove, Juno that giveth life, 
Pluto beneath the earth, and Nestis who 
h Doth with her tears supply the mortal fount. 

By Jupiter he means fire and ether; by Juno he means air and 
by Pluto, the earth and by Nestis and the fountain of all mortals 
(as it were), seed and water. 

The Mystery of Color and Tone in Relation to the Great Mother 

By Wilwam Frank Fraetas 

People will be utterly amazed when they learn what color 
really means spiritually, mentally, emotionally and physically, 
especially when they discover how marvellous and divine are 
the laws by which the Great Mother performs all her wonderful 
operations in Nature. But they will learn to love color and 
feel that nothing is really beautiful and perfect without it. Col- 
ors are the living energetics of life out of which" are eternally 
created all forms, shapes and types in the meshwork of Beauty. 
Glorious sunsets and sky pictures are vibrating thrones of color 
projected on the veil of the atmosphere. These ariel structures 
are emblems of vital mechanisms of life and reflect the mystic 
law of Beauty upon the earth. The rainbow of promise with its 
glorious colors and the solar spectrum, a band of vibrating chro- 
matic forces, are composite sign symbols of life and in them 
are concealed vast stores of wisdom and knowledge. 

The great book of Nature is more or less sealed; only pure 
hearts and minds devoted to truth can obtain the mysteries of 
the keys of the kingdom of heaven or harmony. All keys 
whether of musical ton$ or color represent the universal lan- 
gauge used by our primal 'and original Mother in speaking to 



198 



THE GREAT MOTHER 



her children. Her foundations are four and twelve fold. All 
her mysteries are, primarily speaking, fourfold and out of 
these flow the twelve great streams of color and tonal life of 
the universe. Written on the trestle board of existence we see 
the fourfold division of color, number, tone and form corre- 
sponding to the spiritual, intelligible, emotional and physical 
worlds. The Great Pyramid is so placed that its four faces 
front the four cardinal points : North, South, East and West, 
which corresponds to the four divine letters in the Ineffable 
Name. The fourfold workings of the soul of all things is 
seen in the development of plant life: the seed, the stem, the 
leaf and the fruit; and in the four principal elements of geom- 
etry: the point, the line, the triangle and the square. The 
square represents the great book of wisdom and the temple of 
life. Four is recognized as a great world or Nature number; 
it is also emblematical in a spiritual and perfected sense of the 
mystery of the Holy City that lies four square in its descent 
upon the earth with its three gates to the north, three gates to 
the south, three gates to the east and three gates to the west: 
The vision of Universal Love and Peace. 

In mystic masonry there were twelve original points and they 
correspond to the twelve tribes, twelve apostles and twelve fun- 
damental divisions of time and space symbolized by the twelve 
signs of the Zodiac. The measuring reed or rod of the Divine 
Mother divided the color and musical scale into exactly twelve 
equal parts. Their correspondences are as follows: 



Sign 


Color 


Tone 


Aries 


Red 


C 


Taurus 


Red-Orange 


C Sharp 


Gemini 


Orange 


D 


Cancer 


Yellow-Orange 


D Sharp 


Leo 


Yellow 


E 


Virgo 


Yellow- Green 


F 


Libra 


Green 


F Sharp 


Scorpio 


Blue-Green 


G 


Sagittarius 


Blue 


G Sharp 


Capricorn 


Blue- Violet 


A 


Aquarius 


Violet 


A Sharp 


Pisces 


Red -Violet 


B 



"- — 



the; great mother 199 

Those who understand mystic masonry know that the key- 
stone is emblematical of strength. It is placed at the top of the 
arch because it represents the strongest, and most elevated part, 
and its principal office is to bind all the other stones firmly to- 
gether. The key-stone is placed on a point corresponding to 
the yellow-orange in the color scale and tone D-sharp in the 
musical scale. The tone D-sharp and the Yellow-orange color 
correspond in ancient mysteries to the Mother, Sophia or Heav- 
enly Wisdom, the Perfection and Completion of the Universe. 
She is the receptive, moulding and shaping power of all worlds 
and systems and in her is every life comprehended, developed 
and completed. She not only holds the essence of all life and 
the productive power of all Nature, but she is also all the di- 
vine substance or material out of which all things are made. 
Yellow-orange and D-sharp signify the great ocean of Life and 
Being, the sacred pond, the dew from heaven, the circle of 
waters, the celestial sea which surrounds and envelopes all parts 
of the universe and makes of it the theatre of all subsequent 
manifestations. This color and tone vibrate to the Universal 
Queen of Heaven, highly elevated and gloriously exalted, the 
Infinite Presence of the Holy Spirit or the Divinity of Nature. 

The ancients conceived the veil of life to be the robe of the 
Holy and Blessed Mother of all worlds. The variegated and 
beautiful colors; the mystic and sweet sounds of world life 
symbolize her various powers, potencies, essences, life agents 
and elements. The feminine principle personifies the universal 
force of Mother Nature manifesting life on all planes and con- 
trolling the beneficient cycles of time and eternity ; also the perpet- 
ual evolutions of all being. She collects, assembles and arranges 
all things and keeps the Universe in divine order. She is the 
Divine Keeper of the House — the High Priestess in the Temple 
— The Infinite Presence guarding, preserving, protecting and 
guaranteeing the very consecutiveness and continuity of all life; 
she holds the book of the Law of Life in her hands in which 
all our members are inscribed. She is the life, the fountain, 
and the giver of all fruitfulness and perfections; the vital, sen- 
sitive, inbreathing principle and soul of all things. 



14 



1/ 



200 THE GREAT MOTHER 

The Great Mother and Air 

It was Anaximenes who discovered and declared that "our soul 
is Air and holds us together in the same way as wind and Air en- 
compass the whole world." Evidently he discovered some myster- 
ies and some spiritual significance of Air. He knew "the Breath" 
and most likely dreamed all the senses which "soul" and "air" car- 
ry in the various human languages. How could he have been with- 
out thoughts on the play of forces in the atmosphere, when he ob- 
served the changes of the sky; the vapors and mists, how they 
come and go; the freshness of the morning Air and the miasma 
of low levels and their respective influences; and signs of 
Autumn, the revelations of Spring; the tyranny of Summer 
and the purging of Winter death. Anaximenes may have gone 
as far as the later Theophrastus and noticed that "the air dif- 
fers in rarity and in density as the nature of things is different. 
When very attenuated it becomes Fire; when more condensed, 
wind and cloud; and when still more condensed, Water and 
earth and stone; and all other things are composed by these"; 
and he may like Theophrastus, have regarded motion as eternal 
and as the producer of all changes. Whatever may be said by a 
modern scientist about Anaximenes' physics, this is a fact that by 
intuition he found and defined what Greek consciousness had 
felt and religiously later called the queen of the air : Athena who 
corresponded to the Egyptian Neith at Sais. Neith was to Sais 
what Amen was to Thebes. She was styled "mother of the gods," 
"goddess-mother." Athena was not physical air, but "among" 
oxygen and hydrogen, etc. ; these were upheld by her. She is the 
power of the Air ; its spirit. As there can be no action or change 
in Nature without Air, so Athena is the spirit of all. Ruskin has 
analyzed Athena. His "The Queen of the Air" explains her as 
"in the heavens," "in the earth," and "in the heart." I recom- 
mend my reader to study that book. It is Nature-Mysticism of 
high order and is an intellectual presentation. Athena of the 
Greek poetic consciousness sprang fullborn from Zeus' brain. 
That means that she is the Dawn springing from the East, and 
the light of Dawn is Wisdom, new intelligence, or "fresh Air." 
To awaken and to be intelligent means the same. A Nature- 
Mystic could not worship Athena under the various poetic per- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 201 

sonifications of the Agora, the art studio or the Academy! He 
sees her in the Air only, the Air as that ever-present element, 
he can not get away from, if he wished. He hears her in the 
winds and music to him is the ever chaste virgin's love-making 
by sweet undulations pf sound. He does not study music, he 
simply feels it and communes. The Nature-Mystic "lives in the 
Air" or "the breath of life." He knows about the mystic rela- 
tionship between the "man of dust of the ground" and the breath 
of life "breathed into his nostrils." These two are not merely 
as cup and contents, they are one. The dust of the ground 
are "centers of force." They are the powers of activity in 
the infra world. When Jesus breathed upon His disciples, He 
"breathed His breath" upon them and conveyed the Holy Spirit. 
The Breath is the Spirit and the Spirit is the Breath. Oxygen 
is an ascending line. Nitrogen is a descending; together and 
with numerous other elements of the Air, they are the Breath. 
In the Air there are an immense number of "airs," living, dead, 
healthy or noxious. They produce ferments and disturbances 
as well as health and happiness. They are occult in their 
character and only controlled by "magic." Air envelopes us 
everywhere and always. Our body or personal temple is built 
out of Air solidified for the time being and stands in constant 
rapport to it, changing into it, drawing from it and at times 
being a magic agent. Like other organic beings with lungs we 
fill a ministry and our lungs are the pulpit in which the Word 
is spoken, so that the throat can utter it. The spoken Word 
is Air vibrating the Great Mother's intensity and purpose. With- 
out Air the Word would remain slumbering. Possibilities do not 
build Humanity into Temples. Air translated into command 
creates a universe. 

Air is a mystery. Nature-Mystics study it and know many 
inexpressible secrets. When Jesus answered Satan, the se- 
ducer, "it is written," He did not quote Hebrew scriptures. 
He raised His hand and pointed the Falsifier to the atmospheric 
film and showed him "it is written." The traducer saw the 
writing, read it and said nothing in reply. There was nothing 
to say. The Air is Bible language, the universal language. The 
spirit reads it. The tongue interprets truth variously, but can 
not change it. Why do we look into the Air, when we are per- 



202 THE GREAT MOTHER 

plexed? Instinctively we know it holds the answer to our ques- 
tion and the form of our lfe — could we only see it and under- 
stand it. But, all, excepting Nature-Mystics, look down and on 
the ground they tread, the very action they should avoid. The 
instinct which causes us to look up was born when the Air was 
our natural habitat. It is now a survival from a larger life. In- 
ner-Life people and Nature-Mystics endeavor to recover the 
larger life. 

The Great Mother and Water 

I remember it so well. It is as if it were but yesterday and 
yet it is more than fifty years ago. I was no child. My soul 
was strong. I stood on the brink and looked over the Waters 
to the island of Fuen. The sea there was violet-blue as it al- 
ways is on a Summer afternoon. There was no whisper of 
wind; a feeling of weariness of the heat lay upon the landscape 
and the silence was a burden. The flowers closed their golden 
cups; they were tired. I was there on the cliffs to drink of the 
Waters of Dream. I knew nobody would disturb me. Even 
the field mouse knew that peace ruled. The measure of life 
is best found by means of sunlight from the sea. Waters alone 
can force great ideas and the seawind can shape them. Rather 
suddenly as if blown out of the Infinite, a great cloud came from 
the Northeast. "Iff" grew rapidly into an impenetrable mass, 
now and then lightened by phosphorescent gleams, awesome and 
indescribable; I thought I was in for it, as they say. But oh! 
marvel, the cloud and its Waters passed by me as if limited by 
a strong wall. I could see the line of demarcation which sepa- 
rated it from me and I could see it follow that line over the 
city behind and to the right of me. It was a cloud of Water 
and it carried along with it some birds, dead, I presume. They 
passed too quickly for my observation. It was a singing cloud. 
The Waters were wild with music, a music of their own com- 
position. Had I had Keltic blood in me, I would now have in- 
terpreted it and spoken worthily about its foreign Beauty its 
eloquence and youth, but all I can say is that the cloud was 
real Water because it drenched every thing on its way and that 
its voice was human. There was a triumphant note in its aw- 
fulness ; I heard organ notes and short sharp sounds like trump- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 203 

et blasts ; they cut as if they were sword blades ; the Air whined 
under the stroke. But all the sounds were substantial it seemed 
to me. They were beings, though not human nor elemental 
as I used to think about them and image them. They must have 
been Waterbeings, N^ature-forms. Watermusic is familiar to 
me from the tides and the monotone of the never-ending song 
of the wastes and the roaring of the sea and its complaints 
where the waves break the ice. I know what the brooks say 
when they talk and what the slow river intimates. I know 
the voice of the four winds. When the North winds howl over 
the ocean, no human ear can interpret what they say, so loud 
and fearful are they. The East wind in Denmark kills and 
brings consumption, the white death. The West wind the 
Greeks called Zephyr and it blows love and delight kisses and 
roses. The South wind blows human history and tells many a 
tale, heroic or hellish. There was nothing of that kind of music 
in the Waters which flew by me wrapped in their own mystery. 
They gave the impression of being an instrument emitting music. 
But who was the player ? Could that mass of Water have been a 
mass of sensations? I think so. That interpretation would ac- 
count for the human elements. Is not the music of Nature the 
Great Mother's sensations and an expression of her emotional 
relationship to us men? She expresses herself by wave and 
wind. In the tempest she speaks in wild crescendos and 
"agitato." I heard her passionate language on that afternoon, 
but I do not know the cause of her agitation. The people of 
the country must have angered her. I could not have been the 
cause, since she passed me by. She did not spill a drop of Water 
on me nor blow my clothes or sway my person. The Waters 
were imperious in their power; they were titanic rather than 
grand. Their wet arms and hands would no doubt have 
wrenched great trees from their moorings had there been any. 
Their voice was fierce and growling yet withal symphonous and 
I received pleasant impressions from the numerous intonations 
and modulations of the moment. The hisses and rages and 
roars blended well with the other voices and I can imagine them 
all obeying some plan far transcending human understanding. 
The high tones gave me an uneasy feeling in the temples, but 
drew architectural designs in my mind. I saw forts, bridges 



204 THE GREAT MOTHER 

and towers and souls without bodies, only expressed in lines. 
The middle tones affected me pleasantly and I wish I could hear 
them again, especially when I am sorrowful. Something in them 
made me quick step and my own motion overcame the harsh and 
discordant sounds. 

"Tho' inland far we be 
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 
Which brought us hither." 

And that "immortal sea," 

"Calm or convulsed, in breeze, or gale, or storm, 
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 
Dark heaving," 

is the Great Mother in one form of her manifestations. The 
ocean may well be called with Milton "the womb of Nature and 
perhaps her grave." His mother, the sea, recalled Swinburne 
from his wanderings to 

Charm him from his own soul's separate sense 
With infinite and invasive influence. 

Most mystical life depends upon the sea, viz., the mystic 
tidings and voices of yearning which come from the deep where 
no storms rage. But only few learn the secret of the sea be- 
cause they dare not brave its dangers; yet the sea never des- 
troys the free. Nature-Mystics are receptive. They like to as- 
sociate with the Great Mother near Water. 

In his "Ethics of the Dust," Ruskin tells a charming little 
story which is very suggestive. "One morning after Alice had 
gone, Dotty was very sad and restless when she got up; and 
went about, looking into all corners, as if she would find Alice 
in them and at last she came up to me, and said : 'Is Alice gone 
over the great sea?' And I said, 'Yes, she is gone over the great 
deep sea, but she will come back again some day.' Then Dotty 
looked around the room; and I had just poured some Water 
out into the basin; Dotty ran to it, and got up on a chair, and 



TH3 GREAT MOTHER 205 

dashed her hand through the Water, again and again, and cried : 
'Oh, deep, deep sea ! Send little Alice back to me.' f> 

It is as Ruskin remarked, "The whole heart of Greek myth- 
ology is in that; the idea of a personal being in the elemental 
power ; of its being mojyed by prayer ; and of its presence every- 
where, making the broken diffusion of the elemental sacred." 
Indeed the whole of Nature-Mysticism is in this act of Dotty's. 
Water is Water wherever it is, connected or not, in a pitcher 
or in the ocean, it is one whole and responds to a familiar ad- 
dress. Like Air, which is "the Waters above," it is everywhere 
and is a great magic agent. Water communes us with the Great 
Mother, whether in the baptism or by our draining of the soil. 
Whether we drink it or it washes out the Air, Water is a re- 
generator and a Living Presence. Without Water no life, light 
or color, hence no wisdom. 

The Great Mother and Earth 
I may well sing with Homer : 

O universal Mother, who dost keep 
From everlasting thy foundations deep, 
Eldest of things, Great Earth, I sing to Thee. 

And with Byron I will address her: 

mother Earth by the bright sky above thee, 

1 love thee, O, I love thee! 
So let me leave thee never, 
But cling to thee for ever, 
And hover round thy mountains, 
And flutter round thy fountains. 

And pry into thy roses fresh and red; 
And blush in all thy blushes, 
And flush in all thy flushes, 
And watch when thou art sleeping, 
And weep when thou art weeping, 
And be carried with thy motion, 
As the rivers and the ocean, 
As the great rocks and the trees are 



206 THE GREAT MOTHER 

O Mother, this were glorious life, 
This were not to be dead. 

O mother Earth, by the bright sky above thee, 
I love thee, O, I love thee ! 

And why not? Homer truly addressed her "Earth, Mother of 
all." Is she not mother of us all? Is she not the divine womb 
which has carried us and sat us upon her lap? And let us run 
free? On looking deep into Beauty, we find her there. Asking 
for a tangible form of Spirit, we find she has furnished it. 
What is man's frame but her substance? She gives us her own 
flesh to eat and her juices are our drinks. If I wish to stretch 
my limbs, I climb her mountains. I rest on her rocks and lie 
myself down to sleep on her bosom. I refresh my soul by her 
aromas. What is there I can do without her, directly or indi- 
rectly? I may well say that the soil is divine because it mothers 
me and trains me. And let us no more talk about being "of 
earth, earthly" except when we stand in our own folly and diso- 
bedience. That kind of earthiness is of ourselves. The Great 
Mother did not teach us that. The Mother's gospel is regenera- 
tion, rejuvenescence and not stagnation, death. Her body is but 
a veil, hiding another body still more beautiful. Her fire is "holy 
fire" and the etheric garment of her obedient children. The 
disobedient ones burn in it and are in pain. Her messages are for 
sick souls and full of that greater life which is health and pros- 
perity. She only asks for renunciation and detachment for the 
sake of resurrection. At all other times and occasions she of- 
fers us her world for use and enjoyment, but she does not say 
"for indulgence." Nay, the golden bridge and the yearning land- 
scape she paints when the day closes his blue eyes, is an invitation 
to follow her into Mystery. I think the poet, Charles L. O'Don- 
nell, was right, at any rate, he guessed one mystery of the Great 
Mother. He sang 

The earth was made in twilight, and the hour 
Of bending dusk and dew is still her own, 
Soft as it comes with promise and with power 
Of folded heavens, lately sunset-blown. 



. THE GREAT MOTHKK 207 

Yes, there is an Earth-hour at the end of the day and it lasts 
all the night. It speaks in curves and restful whispers. It is 
never stormy or boisterous and does not make man vulgar or 
sinful. It is full of marriages. In it we receive all we give. The 
stars time the hour and the moon lightens the highways. But 
the clock does not know the hour, nor does the factory whistle 
announce it. The birds know it. The dreamers know it. The 
Nature-Mystic knows it because in that hour Mother 
Nature speaks to him about the bourne of the Eternal 
Life, about ascending efforts, about onward drifts and love in 
higher spheres. The Earth-hour is especially the hour for the 
Mystic, the Nature-Mystic. He is then himself as at no other 
time. At that hour the Great Mother allows him a freedom in 
which She neither is nor is not what She otherwise is, or, to put 
it another way, She both is and is not. With all the energy there 
is in him he may at that hour see himself as her master. She 
puts life into his images and the next day he can realize them and 
make them cold facts. The hour is holy and he partakes in 
Nature's worship. He drinks the Sakti cup of the ever self-re- 
vealing Nature. His poetic sense is opened and he understands 
Sushumna. The Earth-hour is the hour of "cosmic emotion," 
a sympathy with Nature as it has been called. It is the hour 
of yearning for the great heart of the Divine Mother; the hour 
of pulsation or passion for her ; the hour when man and she feel 
as one. It is the hour when we can talk about the humanity of 
the universe. 

The Thracian poet who lived before Homer knew this hour 
and sang about the sky as the wings of the animated Godhead ; 
about the ether as the intellect and the mountains as her body 
and the sun and moon as her eyes. He did not deal in fancies. 
In the Earth-hour disappear both "the finite" and "the infinite" ; 
the Eternal only is realized, and the "all perfect" Beauty is known 
by affinity. It is an hour of mingling and exchanging Nature with 
the Eternal. The hour may also well be called the hour of "cosmic 
consciousness." The rites of initiation into the ancient mysteries 
were discovered in the Earth-hour, and they expressed the mys- 
teries which Nature as the Hierophant, the Great Mother as the 
guiding priest, shows and teaches in the twilight of that hour. The 
mysteries are hinted at above and taught in the Golden Verses. 



2o8 the; great mother 

Whitman saw something of the mysteries when he opened his 
"scuttle at night" and "outward and outward and forever out- 
ward," "the farsprinkled systems" spread, "expanding, always 
expanding," and he exclaimed "A Kosmos am I." He was a 
Nature-Mystic at that time. As many of us are Nature-Mystics, 
who, in cosmic consciousness and with cosmic emotion, can say 

Mother of man's time-traveling generations, 
Breath of his nostrils, heart-blood of his heart, 

God above all gods worshipped of all nations, 
Light above light, law beyond law, thou art.* 

"The great god Man, which is God," is the Great Mother. She 
is present with us in the holiness of instinct. Let us worship. 

"Trailing clouds of glory, we do come from God, who is 
our home." 

Let us return, ere we forget our first love ! 

The Great Mother and Fire 

Nature-Mysticism has a strong teacher in Heraclitus. The 
Stoics, too, were Nature-Mystics and expressed themselves very 
clearly about Fire when they called the Deity Fire. Seneca wrote 
that it was indifferent whether the creator of the world was 
called God or Fire or Destiny or an all-prevading Breath, the 
terms all meant the same. According to Stoicism every particu- 
lar element is in the process of time developed out of l^ire and will 
return to Fire again. Fire here means according to Chrysippus, 
the Divine Breath. 

The popular mind is not mystic, nor even natural; it is arti- 
ficial and non-natural and sometimes un-natural. It deals with 
Fire in the same dull and stupid way it deals with all the other 
marvels of Mother Nature's work. It is unable, so long as it re- 
mains in bondage to itself and its own stupidity, to see that 
Spirit and Matter are not separated by any real barrier. Spirit 
and Matter are but the two lines of an arc. The arch is the most 



* Swinburne, Song before Sunrise. 



' ^■^-- ^ - 



THE GREAT MOTHER 209 

typical of the Great Mother's symbols. To a Nature-Mystic Fire 
is far more than combustion. He knows it perfectly well as a 
chemical combination which evolves heat and light. He fixes his 
attention on the transmutation which takes place. He knows that 
both force and energy remain. He watches for the New. In Fire 
he sees Nature arise. "All things are exchanged for Fire, and Fire 
for all things." Fire is the magic wand ; the Great Mother trans- 
fers some of her own intensity into us when she wants us to act : 
she fires us ! And so everywhere. But combustion is not con- 
sumption. "A hidden fire* burns perpetually upon the hearth of 
the world. Scientific men call it by the hard name of eremacausis, 
which means quiet (or slow) burning. We see its effects in the 
fading of leaves, in the rusting of iron, in the mantling of the 
rosy blush upon the cheek of youth. Every tree is a burning 
bush. In a glory of blossoms vegetation, in Spring, flowers from 
its embers. The lips of the crimson-tipped daisies are touched 
with a live coal from off the great altar of Nature. We speak of 
the lamp of life as a mere poetic expression, but it is scientifically 
true ; our bodies are burning away as on a funeral pyre, and every 
breath we exhale is the smoke of the Fire that consumes us." 
We all know the utilitarian import of Fire, but forget the relig- 
ion of all our utilitarianism. Our early ancestors worshipped 
Fire, and rightly. Max M tiller has explained how the Aryan God 
Agni from being purely a physical god gradually, by spiritualiza- 
tion, became the supreme god. Civilization can show how Fire 
from being the highest religious type has become to the modern 
man a mere commonplace — except when he thinks of Hellfire, he 
has quite lost fear of it ! 

It was out of a limited understanding Schiller said 

the elements are hostile 
To the work of human hands. 

Nay, Fire is not hostile, Fire is self-assertive. Let us not dare to 
oppose the Great Mother when she makes Fire. The dictum "let 
there be light" can not be opposed with impunity. "Whirlwinds of 
tempestuous fire" are always ready to burst out from the Un- 



* Hugh McMillan: Two "Worlds are Ours: the Autumn Fire. 



210 THE GREAT MOTHER 

known. Fire is the Great Breath; the Great Breath is Fire. 
Only the pure can live in it and only the pure can rise to it and 
they rise by means of Fire. Purity means a self-centredness 
corresponding to Fire's self-assertiveness. And self-centredness 
means that all foreign elements are eliminated and we 
live by our own law. A common simile explains it. 
By smelting the dross is eliminated and the gold remains. 
The gold is also melted, but readily reassumes its 
"terrestrial" condition or that condition necessary for it to be of 
use on earth. In its essence it is Love and Wisdom ; in its "being 
in this world" it is of this world's nature and exists as a metal. 
Fire is its means of transmutation from spirit to matter. This is 
Nature-Mysticism of Fire. Nature-Mysticism leads to self-reali- 
zation and the self-assertiveness of Fire is the Mother's first les- 
son. There is no idleness in Nature-Mysticism and no effeminacy. 
It encourages to awe and work. The old Iranians were instructed 
to "give to the Fire and the Earth their natural nourishment" and 
"take care that the cow does not low against you." The self- 
assertiveness of Fire destroys limitations and establishes Eternal 
Duration. Who is willing to burn ? The chosen people ! Not "the 
creeping things of the Earth." 

No Fire is as real as the swing between life and death. It never 
burns out. It is ceaseless. A minister to sick and hungry souls 
finds himself thrown into that Fire continuously. Men and women 
make a sacrifice of him at once that they may build their homes of 
happiness. Him they do not care about. They want and they 
take what he brings. If he resists unawares, they slay him and 
plunder. They are like the running Fire over a forest bottom. 
The small creeps and the beautiful flowers are consumed together 
with the rotten stumps. It is with difficulty that a stop is put to 
the Fire's ferocity and mercilessness. Woe to the minister who 
has not Fire in himself to resist the devouring flames of his aud- 
ience. He is lost. He must be strong as the Sun over against a 
campfire. The beasts of the Open fear a campfire ; they may array 
themselves around the encircling Fire that protects the camper, 
but they do not go any further. They stare at him and he can see 
their wild eyes in the dark. The camper for the time being is 
the Sun. His intelligence is the Sun and superior. From the 
platform the minister must be a Sun and master over the wild 



TH£ GREAT MOTHER 211 

and passionate elements of the audience. Every member is ready 
to tear him to pieces if he is not Fire and speaks as a master. 
The mystery is there. He is Fire, the audience is Fire and the 
action is Fire. The Mother is also there and She is both sacrifice 
and the saerificer and the mystery. What is the ministry I speak 
about ? How it is filled ? By work ! Work is burning, is Fire ! 
The Parsees were to worship Fire by digging canals, tilling the 
soil, giving seed to the Earth and destroying "the creeping things." 
A minister worships by restraining another's passions, by putting 
him or her to useful work ; by starting such vibrations which move 
the masses and set them in tuneful harmony. His work is like 
the prayer to Ahura-Mazda : "Offering and praise I vow to Thee 
O Fire! Be Thou honored in the dwellings of men! Blessed the 
man who constantly brings fuel and the implements of service 
to Thee! Mayest Thou burn evermore in this house, through 
the long time, to the resurrection day. Give me swift brightness, 
food, and means of life! Give me wisdom and prosperity, and 
readiness of speech! etc., etc." The Fire-minister, he who is the 
greater Fire, the Sun, asks these boons in order to labor more and 
longer, not for personal gratification. Fire is always a doer and 
a giver. Whatever is thrown into it is reworked into its original 
constituents and returned to the All. Nothing is retained and 
When the work is done, the Fire goes away to return when called 
or when needed. Fire is a process and holds nothing for self. 
Ministry is not for self. Self and ministry are opposites. When 
they meet self is burned or there is no ministry. Where there 
is ministry, there is no self. Firdusi tells us that Zoroaster ad- 
vised Gushtap "to learn the rites and doctrines of the religion of 
'excellence' (fire worship) for without religion there can not be 
any worth in a king." I may well say learn of Fire who the Great 
Mother is. Nature-Mysticism is true religion and no kingship 
or mastery without it. I call Heraclitus a Nature-Mystic, not be- 
cause they call him the Dark, but because he could read the face 
of the Great Mother and understood the rhythm of her features. 
He knew that "the order of all things" is not "created by any 
of the gods" but is from Her, the Eternal ; Her, the Living Fire. 
He had realized the essential kinship of all things and Man with 
Her, hence his ability to apprehend her mystery. 

The Great Mother's mystery which some call life and death, 



212 THE GREAT MOTHER 

he described as combustion. Upon her face he saw ever dan- 
cing, flashing, darting, flickering moods, like flames ever active, 
yet ever disappearing. Upon her bodily form, we saw the ever 
changing lines of a stream, never the same, yet for all that, 
seemingly so. All things flow from Fire and return to Fire and 
this Fire-motion is life. In Nature nothing passes away, it trans- 
mutes itself to something else. All things are and are not. 

Heraclitus voices the Great Mother's solicitude for her children 
by these words: "The Law which I unfold, men insensible and 
half asleep, will not hear, and hearing, will not comprehend." 
Men are insensible, gross and beastly; that is the Mother's sor- 
row. Heraclitus enunciated a system of pure Monism, the only 
way on which we can fully realize the Great Mother. Dualism is 
one of her ways of working, but it never gives us herself in full 
view. Following is the first paragraph of Heraclitus' work on 
Nature: "It is wise for those who hear, not me, but the Univer- 
sal Reason, to confess that all things are one." The eighteenth 
paragraph of Heraclitus, reads: "lightning rules all," or, "light- 
ning is the helmsman of the universe." As Fire is no metaphor 
to Heraclitus, so neither is lightning. But Heraclitus is no ma- 
terialist. His fire is the Great Mother's energy. When she 
shows her intensity, it flashes earthward like lightning and il- 
lumines the edges of our clouds. It is momentary, but her mo- 
ments are as long as eternity and as broad as ageless life and as 
deep as infinity. Her lightning or facial expression men call 
spirituality. 

To the ancients the Hearth-Fire was a sort of moral being. "The 
god of human nature." Vesta was the goddess of the Hearth- 
Fire and she was goddess neither of fecundity nor power alone. 
She was the universal soul to the Greeks and Romans ; the god- 
dess of Order or "Marriage," and therefore the goddess of 
Home. How beautiful! Fire is a form of the Great Mother, 
the Eternal Being, and by its mobility we are enabled to see 
ourselves as "trailing clouds of glory." 

Animals and Plants 

Nature-Mystics realize their relationship to the whole organic 
world. Not only do they not antagonize Animals and Plants, but 
they sympathize with them and the sympathy is returned. Nu- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 213 

merous tales from the most varied sources and told in all lan- 
guages of the world bear testimony to this. Everybody knows 
the story of Andronicus and the lion. 

Animals and Plants are our passions but now outside and 
apart from us, and they are outside as a result of "the fall" or 
evolution; but they tend or gravitate to their respective centres, 
and, we shall not be "complete" till they and we are reunited in 
the ultimate Wholeness towards which all life indirectly strives. 

Poets, the natural sympathizers, have exhausted language to 
express the emotions which have been roused by their approach 
to flowers, trees and Animals and the company they have kept 
with them. Lately Anatole France and Maeterlink have given 
respectively trees and Animals a mystic setting. However, they 
have not reached the mystery of the oak and the bee but they 
have perceived the family relationship. Modern Mystics have 
yet much to learn before they feel the power of the mistletoe, the 
lotus, the serpent and the cat, for instance. Lovesickness with 
trees is not insanity. The animal trainer's power is not mere 
suggestion. The reproachful look in the horses', cows' or dogs' 
eye when they are unjustly hit is eloquent with the cry of hu- 
manity. 

Let us teach our children not to hate an Animal and pursue it, 
and not wantonly to chop off the blossoms of the wild flowers or 
tear off all the flowers they see on an excursion with the intention 
of taking them home and at last throw them away by the roadside 
because they droop and die, having been torn from their right- 
ful surroundings. The Buddhists have a sense and respect for 
an insect which the Occidentals have not nor even mention in 
their loud talks about doing good. Let us learn to do good to 
the brute creation. That is one way to conquer passions. We 
and they are interiorly related and influence each other by 
mystic cords. Nature's equilibrium depends upon adjustments 
on this field. All the Great Mother's methods of education cen- 
tralize in one general endeavor: to harmonize passions, not to 
destroy them. If we destroy them on one field, they reappear 
on another. We must transmute, not kill. And all Nature's 
living voices call for peace, not for conflict. The undertone 
everywhere is sorrowful and expresses a soul full of reproach. 
Have any of my readers heard the "peace and good will" of the 



214 TH] S GREAT MOTHER 

Open as the key to the gospel preached by man? Are we not 
still hunting Animals searching for what we may devour ? Is the 
Earth everywhere ready for the Temple ? How about the Christ's 
glorious body? Nature-Mystics labor to build the temple and to 
establish God's-Body. 

Nature-Spirits 
All that which I said in the foregone paragraphs is not Spirit- 
ism or Demonology. By the elements Air, Water, Earth and Fire 
are not meant powers residing in the elements, such as sylphs, 
nymphs, pigmies or salamanders. These are creations of super- 
stition and not forms of the Great Mother. Nor are Air, Water, 
Earth and Fire Spirits, such as I have referred to them above, 
Elementaries or astral corpses. They are unseen ministers work- 
ing like dew, the frost or the wind on mysterious errands, yet 
they are not separate from the Great Mother any more than the 
aroma is separable from the flower, and they work everywhere in 
the same way and are never present any more nor any less. 
Aroma of the rose in Persia is aroma of a rose in America, how- 
ever much they may vary in degree of culture. The wind is 
the wind, whether here or at the north pole ; whether it carries ice 
in its arms or not. The four are everlasting associates of ours and 
specially occupied with our affairs. As an illustration I refer to 
the story of the angel which stirred the Waters at Bethesda. That 
angel was evidently a personality, yet mixed so with the Waters 
in the pool, that they acquired medicinal powers. And I quote 
the Psalmist who addressed Jahveh as making the winds His 
messengers and flames of Fire His ministers. The four are cos- 
mic forces. The "morning stars" shouted for joy. They are 
"higher" than we because of their more universal domain ; and 
they are "stronger," "mightier" in their macrocosmic relations, 
yet they serve us in our microcosmic conditions. We have pos- 
sibilities in the direction of manifoldness, which they apparently 
have not. Their power and life is in one direction only; on one 
plane only ; while we can enter several. 

The Great Mother and Dance 
"Nature draws Her random pictures through the year." Her 
pictures are shown by her Dances. A Dance is a revelation of 
character. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 21 5 

The ancient mysteries* everywhere were dramatic ceremonials 
to represent the recurring events of Nature, as they pass before 
man in cyclic forms and as they connect with human welfare. In 
Egypt the Drama was presented in the form of the myth of 
Osiris and Isis and could be interpreted astronomically, as the 
rotation of the twelve months of the year, also as having refer- 
ence to human life and death. In Phoenicia and adjoining 
countries the drama was the life, death and resurrection of 
Attis, Adonis. In the Scandinavian North it was the story of 
Baldur, his murder and the restoration of the gods after Rag- 
narok. Among the Zuni Indians, it is the celebration of the re- 
turning seed time and of harvest, the opening of fishing and 
hunting season; the Winter that follows with apparent death to 
the seed in the soil; the Spring, and then the growth, the final 
blossoming and seed, and the subsequent harvest. The creation 
story in seven days as told in Genesis must be considered as a 
remaining fragment from some ancient Semitic mystery play, 
and can be read astrologically, cosmically and psychologically. It 
is one of the most precious mystery documents we possess. In 
Greece, the drama of the seed, its death and resurrection in the 
Spring, was told and enacted in the mysteries under the personi- 
fication of Demeter-Proserpine. 

The Great Mother's Invitation to Dance 

The Great Mother's plan with her seasonal changes 
is to invite us to dance or to follow her method of 
life. The design in all her doings is our benefit, it 
seems. It does not appear that she works for herself alone. 
It is her method to be gradual. As she unfolds, so may we un- 
fold by following her method. Nowhere else can we learn the 
gradual. It is not in our mind. Our bodies live by degrees, but 
that is her doing, not ours. Her method is rhythmic. Without 
her there would be no motion, no music, no poetry. There would 
be an unbroken Now which would not benefit us. The moral of 
this is of course, that we should study her methods and "live 
according to Nature." We can not live according to Spirit or 
according to ourself till we have graduated from Mother Na- 

* Compare my article "The Mysteries Universal" in The Word, 1913. 
15 



2l6 THD GREAT MOTHER 

ture's nursery school. To "live according to Nature" means to 
live according to the law of our (own) life, and the nature of 
the universe. Not according to part of our nature, but to our 
whole nature. 

The Yearly Dance 

The Great Mother conducts her organic life on the mystic 
cycle of the year: by seasons. The various religions begin the 
seasons variously, but they all attribute occult senses to them 
and the Mysteries were conducted progressively according to 
seasons. Many philosophical schools among the ancients also 
followed this yearly progress of the sun through the Zodiac in 
their arrangement of classes for teachings. With the old Romans, 
the year began in March. This month stood alone in the mystery 
of solitude and singleness. It meant Newyears and the rekindling 
of the Vestal Fires. April was the month of opening or unfold- 
ing of vegetation; May, the month of growth and June, the 
month of ripening and perfecting. The following months did not 
have names descriptive of Nature's operations, they were "hu- 
man" rather than "natural," viz., Nature was looked upon as 
not directly operative but as resting and gradually going down 
"into the grave." A similar idea prevailed in Egypt, and, "the 
progress of the soul" on the Path follows in that order. It is 
rhythmic and renewed yearly. I call the first season Christmas. 

Christmas Vibrations 

Christmas time is not merely a thought-form, it is a Nature- 
fact and it is the Nature- fact which gives character to the 
Christmas thought. Astronomically Christmas is that moment in 
which the sun comes up upon the northern hemisphere, and, cere- 
monially, Christmas depends upon that time. But in the Great 
Mother's economy, Christmas is more than a moment. She ex- 
tends her hours of instruction; she begins before the time ap- 
pointed and continues long after. The main lesson of the season 
is about Light. The Great Mother extinguishes, or almost extin- 
guishes the Light and lights it again. Her object is to teach us to 
do that with ourselves. Her teaching is, that the best way to see 
Light is to put out our own candle. Light a candle at daylight 
and you see the truth of it. Lavoisier said "without Light, Nature 



THE GREAT MOTHER 217 

was without life, inanimate and dead" and thus expressed the 
whole meaning of Christmas scientifically and in correspondence 
with the ancient "Hail, Holy Light! Offspring of heaven, first- 
born!" 

To Light visible corresponds the Word, Light Invisible, though 
audible. The Great Mother works in both ways. Both are 
waves of her intensity and by both she penetrates. Both start 
"new beginnings." Christmas night or wintersolstice was called 
by our Norse ancestors "the mother-night" and Freya with Heim- 
dal, was the goddess of December, the preserver or watchman, 
on one side, in November. And with Forseti, the peace-maker, 
on the other side, in January. These three are the natural forms 
of the Great Mother in the Christmas time or season. In Freya 
the Great Mother is Love, a Water goddess, a Vanadis. She is 
also characteristically called "the fair weeping goddess" and in 
her halls love is renewed after death, if the lovers have been 
faithful. No one escapes her influence. On her travels she is 
accompanied by the three Graces, Sjofn, Lofn and Var, all three 
love attributes. In Heimdal, "the heavenly watchman" and keep- 
er of Bifrost, the Rainbow, the Great Mother, gives us an assur- 
ance that the Dark shall not prevail, though it is necessary in 
her economy. In Forseti, "the peace-maker," she shows us her 
silverlight as she reflects it into the Open from the roof of 
Forseti's dwelling. The Norsemen worshipped Forseti by open- 
ing courts of justice in the open Air when the bright season be- 
gan. These three, Freya, Heimdal and Forseti were the Norse- 
man's expression of his Nature-Mysticism of the Christmas. 
The Great Mother was the centre at this time. She is also in 
the centre in the other three seasons, that of Easter, the Mun- 
dane Tree and that of the colored Leaves. 

Easter* 

"We, in America, got the word Easter from England and 
England got it from Germany, where, among the Saxons at the 
time of the introduction of Christianity, they worshipped a god- 
dess, Eastera, Eostra, and worshipped her annually with a great 
feast at the same time of the year as the Christian Easter is 



* See my Art. "Easter in Nature," The Word, July, 1909. 






2i8 the great mother 

celebrated. It is well known that the early missionaries adopted 
the Church's feasts, fasts and doctrines, to the feasts, fasts and 
doctrines of the people among whom they sought converts. 

"It was not very difficult to get the Eastera feast turned into 
something like Easter in a Christian sense, nor was there any 
real fraud in the matter. The goddess Eostra's, or Eastera's, 
name connects, as it is supposed, with austra, an old Germanic 
word for East, Easterly. The goddess, accordingly, was a sym- 
bol of the East or of sunrise, and such a conception lies also in 
the Christian idea of Easter. The word austra is equal to the 
Sanscrit usas, the Greek ^ws(avcra>s) and the Roman aurora, all of 
which mean daybreak, the red of the early morning, day- 
spring — all Easter ideas. All these words also carried an occult 
sense, now lost. To the ancient peoples, the East meant also the 
opener and opening of the year, of the day, in general the gen- 
trix in all the senses that connect with that word. 

"She represents two conceptions. The first is: she is a god- 
dess of Light, and next: she is a goddess of revivification or re- 
juvenescence, the two main characteristics of Springtime. 

"Here, it is not the place to enter upon the science of Light, 
however interesting it might be. There are, however, a few 
elements of that science which are of vital interest. I will there- 
for bring them forth. In the gospel of Matthew it is reported 
that Jesus said to His disciples : "Let your Light so shine before 
men, that they may see your good works." What can be the 
meaning of this admonition? Are any of you Lights that shine? 
Who are Lights that shine? Is anybody a Light, or is there 
no sense in this direction given by Jesus? Some one will tell 
me, that the word Light here stands figuratively and means in- 
telligence, and that the interpretation of the Lord's words is 
very simple and easy; that they simply mean that we ought 
to speak with intelligence about the divine mysteries, and, that 
we should act rationally and with understanding. Others will 
tell me, that the Light spoken of is the divine Light within, given 
to believers, and so forth; I will accept these explanations as 
part explanation of the Lord's admonition, but I am by far 
not satisfied that they cover the intention of the sentence. The 
word in Greek is 'light physical,' Matth. 5.14. At any rate, 
I answer with another question, a question perfectly legitimate; 



THB GREAT MOTHER 2IO, 

it is this: what do you mean by intelligence and by the divine 
Light? 

1 think some of the difficulties with the Lord's mystic saying 
can be explained when I give you certain facts, such as the fol- 
lowing. Numerous Animals give out light from their bodies. 
You have seen the phosphorescence of lakes. That luminosity 
comes from minute organisms. Glow-worms shed a mild green- 
ish light. Fireflies in the Orient give a wonderful splendor 
to the night Landscape. There are Plants in the Himalayas 
that illuminate mountain sides. Common marigold in dry sea- 
sons throws out a golden light from petal to petal. The evening 
primrose, the scarlet poppy and the sunflower all flash light, and 
many mosses and mushrooms do the same. In fact, Nature's 
cathedral is lit by many and varied Lights, more than I can or 
need enumerate at present. 

"Now, what is the meaning of all this? It is this: that Light 
is the manifestation of life. The life of these organisms is 
Light. And by their Light they are known. This kind of Light 
is not wave motion, but Animal life shown as Light. And this 
Light shines brightly at Easter. If we search the annals of men 
and women who have lived the Mystic life, who have concen- 
trated their vital forces and lived in sublime intensity, we find 
these annals full of records telling about Light flashing forth from 
these people; of Light surrounding them; or transfigurations. 
Here, then, are living Lights in many forms, and now comes the 
interesting point. When we inquire of biology if any season of 
the year is richer than another in such phenomena, then we are 
told that Spring is their time for excellence. What more need I 
say? 'The invisible things of God from the creation of the 
world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are 
made, or the invisible things are seen by means of the visible.' 
The character of our life is seen by the Light we throw off. And 
Spring, especially, is the time when the flame of life glows with 
the strongest Light. The Lord said these words to the disciples 
at the time He delivered the Sermon on the Mount, and the 
ancient tradition is, that the sermon was delivered in the Spring, 
in the month of May. Undoubtedly, I say, He took His illustra- 
tion from the surrounding Nature, as was His custom. And He 
referred to a Light, which is life, something other and different 



r 



220 THE GREAT MOTHER 

from the sun's light spoken of before; and it was that Light 
Jesus told His disciples to let shine. Have I not a right, then, to 
speak of Easter as the Presence with us of a living Light? And 
can I not now turn upon this present generation and ask: 'Is 
your life a Light?' 'Where is your power?' 'Can your life be 
seen in the Light you give forth?' 'Has your Easter this year 
such luminosity about it?' 'Or does the stone still cover the sep- 
ulchre waiting for the angel to remove it?' 

"There is a third aspect of Light which I want to mention, 
because it has a relation to 'Light on the Path' and because 
it connects Easter with the Rosicrucian ideas and symbols. I 
will admit that nobody knows the essential nature of Light, and, 
we cannot tell what it is. But if we translate the term Light 
by another term, then we can gain an insight into its nature 
and its operative force in life. If we translate the word Light 
and say it is Fire, we gain such an insight and an additional or 
third aspect of Light valuable especially at Easter time. Let 
me therefore say that there is Fire in the Air at Easter time. 
A sacred flame flits from hill to dale, from branch to branch, 
from man to man. It is so swift that many never see it, though 
they feel the burn. In honor of this flame, it was once custom- 
ary to light lamps in the Spring and to put on clean clothes 
(not new clothes, as some think). If anyone wishes to see this 
flame, they must open all windows in their house and body and 
go out into the Open to see the coming and going, the advancing 
and the receding waves of life as they sweep up through the 
valleys. When they come home again they shall find the flame. 
It has come in through the open windows and is now burning 
with full force within. 

"Eastern was and is that power which trembles through the 
Earth and through the blood courses of everyone of us. Called 
forth by the touch of the Spring sun, this power flashes now at 
this time through our nerves and arteries and veins, and by and 
by we shall see it leap as lightning from cloud to cloud. We saw 
it recently in the Winter auroras, but were not thrilled by it 
because it was cold; but now at this time it is warm and it 
moulds us and builds us into forms suitable for its own pur- 
poses, and these purposes go to the filling up of the Earth with 
more and new creatures both in the hill of the ants and the 



THE GREAT MOTHER 221 

palaces of men; and where poverty stalks among the miserable, 
and, where music fills the Air, that glad lovers breathe; every- 
where, it surges in flood-tides. Waves of life rise higher than 
ever at this time. The legend has told us that an angel moved 
the stone from the grave and that the Lord came out. The tale 
must be true, because Nature tells us the same story in the 
first warm Spring rain that falls. For it calls forth the Lord 
from the grave by removing the white grave bands of snow and 
by turning the black Earth into green carpets and the gray stalks 
to yellow flowers and its spreads glory over it all. Every Spring, 
when the mists disperse before the strong hand of Mother Na- 
ture's housecleaning, then the child Jesus is born again. The 
angel in the Air, in the woods, in the dell ; that is He again. His 
star is first seen by the shepherds and their flocks, and they start 
the Hallelujah, that is called Easter. 

"I know poets sing of joy in Nature at the time of Easter, 
and I perceive the joy myself. But I know also of no season 
more melancholy than Eastertime in Nature. And the reason is 
Love. A great Love is melancholic and full of sorrows because 
all things are fleeting. Overabundance and pressure of life 
makes us melancholic. Spring at Eastertime is not all rapture. 
Mater Genetrix weaves life for awhile, but soon she feels the 
burden. The looms of Nature weave not only Beauty and form, 
but also pain and sorrow. Spring winds are often stormy and 
rude; they break many a young sprout which cannot dance fast 
enough to the music, and, they crush our boats on rocks as easily 
as we break an Easter egg. But all this has become symbolism 
for us. We learn from it that the new birth is painful, danger- 
ous and sometimes disastrous. And all this adversity strength- 
ens the New Life. 

"Many mystic orders at this time practice the severest asceti- 
cism, fearing the flame that burns within them and which is 
Nature's resurrection life: the soul's yearnings and longings. 
And strange as it must seem to the common mind, Nature at this 
very season of abundance also reminds us that she is the self- 
consuming life, the power, that for a short moment strains her- 
self, and expands in bright colors, only to give way quickly. 
At no season does Nature teach mystic and painful lessons any 
clearer than at Spring. Nature speaks exactly in the same Ian- 



222 THE GREAT MOTHER 

guage as, for instance, Tauler, and says : "The soul must sink into 
the divine darkness, into the secret place of the divine abyss. 
There is no safety save in the abyss." Do we not know it is so? 
Do we not cast the seed into the soil at this season? All this 
means pain. But no crop without it!" 

The reader is invited to read the article in full as it appeared. 
Space forbids further extracts. 

The Mundane Tree, Summer : Being, not the Becoming 

My Norse ancestors called Christmas night "The mother- 
night." In a wider sense some nations or races are "mother- 
races" viz., they are the sources whence come migrations. The 
Scandinavian North is such a mother-race or Mundane Tree. The 
Thracian peninsula is to-day inhabited by people who are the 
descendents of Roman exiles, migratory hordes and Turkish 
conquerers, etc. These people are in no sense a mother-race, 
they are simply the outcomes of confusion confounded. They 
could not and did not originate tribes, races or peoples, who 
broke native boundaries and sought Freedom. Our Scandina- 
vian people were "mothers," sources, "new beginnings." 

The Scandinavian tree, Ygdrasil is rooted in "heaven," viz., 
in the Infinite, hence it sent out roots over the three worlds. It 
grew out of heaven and into the world and did not grow like 
common trees out of the Earth seeking heaven. It was a Mother. 
It was a Norse emblem of the Great Mother. The poets and 
prophets among our Norse ancestors imagined her as a tree, and 
they did well, especially as the tree Ygdrasil was double sexed, 
viz., contained within itself its own origin, end and purpose. 

"The flush of life" is not quite so vigorous in Summer as in 
the Spring, but the speech in the woods is loud enough for all 
who will listen, to hear "the great discourse" about the "tree 
of life." To Jonas, the arbor vitae was an ivy; to Elias, a juni- 
per; to Ismael, a palm; to the Druids it was the mistletoe. To 
the Norsemen it was Ygdrasil, a tree unknown to the botanists 
but very familiar to the Occultist and Nature-Mystic. Singular 
it is that the ancients found the best emblems for themselves in 
trees! They found the truth in Plato's teaching, that we are 
trees. Jesus uses the plant world most frequently as a symbol. 
He calls Himself a vine and speaks about vineyards in the sense 



THE GREAT MOTHER 223 

of the human life of activity. Summer shows the Mundane 
Tree, the Tree of Life. In Summer, the Great Mother central- 
izes like she does at Christmas. The Mundane Tree is her cen- 
tralization in a universal form and shown organically. And 
Summer is a summarizing of life; it is a middle, yet without a 
tangible beginning or end. Ygdrasil, "the bearer of Ygg 
(Odin)," is the most complete of all the mythic or mind creations 
to express a world-embracing idea. 

The Brown and Red Leaves 

Autumn is philosophical, reflective; it is the period for 
thought, for change of colors. And as some will have it, for 
"dreames" and "darke fyre" and I think rightly, because there is 
a peculiar magic in the month, a magic sometimes wild with 
wildness. Yet Autumn is peace, the peace that follows work well 
done. The meadows know that peace and the valleys are serene. 
The gushing life of Spring is forgotten, the fruit delivered and 
the air is full of expectancy and "dreames" about the past joy 
and future repetitions. Even a light frost is welcome. It means 
rest. The "darke fyre" or flowers of flames appear everywhere 
in the fields and woods and they bring runes or magic spells. 
They are forerunners for the Pleiad month, for White Weather 
and the Dusk of the Year. The change of life which comes with 
Autumn does not mean death, nay, it means truth. The bare arms 
of the trees mean sharp and clear lines. All the glamor of Sum- 
mer fades away and facts appear. The fading life is more elo- 
quent than the sprouting. It takes its time ; the young life is in a 
hurry. The Great Mother administers truths which purge and 
consume everything effete. Nature never forgets herself 
in the grave! That which runs away into the ocean from our 
sewers, gathers into new soil at the bottom of the ocean, and on 
that soil Mother Nature will do, as she has done before, resurrect 
a life we have thrown away — ages hence ! No need to doubt it ! 
Visit and husbandman and it shall be learned how she resurrects 
the crops we eat, from refuse and offal of all kinds. The farmer 
laughs at the city man who has not discovered the miracle. He 
knows Nature. Nature can show us what to do with our dead 
selves ! 

We really never know when Autumn is here. We know it as- 



224 TH S GREAT MOTHER 

tronomically, but practically we do not know it, and the reason is 
this, that Nature never draws such sharp and distinct lines as 
the human mind does ; nor does she care for feasts, fasts and 
new-moons; or for wealth or rank or power or science. The 
naturalist will tell us if we have not observed it, that as soon as 
the Leaves fall in the Autumn, the new Leaf is already there ; in 
fact, in many cases it is the new life that pushes the old Leaf off. 
In fact, the Dance of life never ceases in the woods, and the 
brooks keep up the fiddling all Winter. 

In Autumn the Great Mother takes down all her floral cur- 
tains and puts them away never to use them again. But she 
compensates the trees, shrubs and flowers the following Spring 
by new efforts. Nature does as did Penelope, Ulysses' faithful 
wife, who each night unravelled the work of each day, thus re- 
pelling importunate lovers with vain promises. Nature alter- 
nately doffs her embroidery and weaves it back to its old com- 
pleteness and Beauty. She starts weaving anew every Spring, 
as a bride desirous of having a beautiful work to show the bride- 
groom, the Beloved, when he comes. 

The ancients illustrated her methods by the bird Phoenix. 
The bird Phoenix prepares its own nest and nest-fire in the 
Autumn and burns itself. The aroma is full of rejuvenescence 
like the decaying Leaves which form odorous mounds. Death is 
a ministering angel of life. Death has no stony eye, it is rainbow 
colored and a "breathing form of thought." Death "keeps the 
keys of all the creeds" and balances all development. The petri- 
fied flames of Earth's young days are the rocks on which we 
build our houses and fortunes. My lungs are hot furnaces burn- 
ing Air useful for the Plants, and, they in return, do similar 
work for me. 

Tactitus* tells us that the Phoenix** is sacred to the sun, and 
differs from the rest of the feathered species in the form of its 
head and the tincture of its plumage. He calls it a bird sacred to 
the sun and Claudian calls it soils avem (sun-bird). The ancient 
authors 



* Compare my article, Adonis, Phoenix, and Being, in the Metaphysical Magazine 
May 1896. 

** "Annals ", Book vi., 28. 






THfl GREAT MOTHER 225 

"All affirm that it exists ; 
Where it is no one can tell." 

That the Phoenix should be sacred to the sun is but natural, for 
it is simply another term for the activity of the solar orb. The 
sun is a manifestation of the Great Mother. An unknown 
author* has written the following about the Phoenix. His pro- 
duction is often attributed to Lactantius (fourth century). In 
literal translation it reads: "There is a happy spot, retired in 
the first east, where the great gate of the eternal pole lies open. 
It is not, however, situated near to his rising in Summer or in 
Winter, but where the sun pours the day from his vernal char- 
iot. There a plain spreads its open tracts; nor does any mound 
rise, nor hollow valley open itself. But through twice six ells 
that place rises above the mountains, whose tops are thought 
to be lofty among us. Here is the grove of the sun; a wood 
stands planted with many a tree, blooming with the honor of 
perpetual foliage. When the pole had blazed with the fires of 
Phaeton, that place was uninjured by the flames; and when the 
deluge had immersed the world in waves, it arose above the 
waters of the Deucalion. No enfeebling diseases, nor sickly old 
age, nor cruel death, nor harsh fear, approach hither — nor dread- 
ful crime, nor mad desire for riches, nor Mars, nor fury, burn- 
ing with love of slaughter. Bitter grief is absent, and want 
clothed in rags and sleepless cares, and violent hunger. No 
tempest rages there, nor dreadful violence of wind; nor does the 
hoar-frost cover the Earth with cold dew. No cloud extends its 
fleecy covering above the plains, nor does the turbid moisture 
of Water fall from on high ; but there is a fountain in the middle 
which they call by the name of 'living'; it is clear, gentle, and 
abounding with sweet Waters, which, bursting forth once during 
the space of each month, twelve times irrigates all the grove 
with Waters. Here a species of tree, rising with lofty stem, 
bears mellow fruits not about to fall on the ground. This grove, 
these woods, a single bird, the Phoenix, inhabits — single, but it 
lives, reproduced by its own death. It obeys and submits to 
Phoebus Through a desire of being born again, Phoe- 

*" The Ante-Nicene Fathers." Ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson, Am. Repr., N. Y., 
1888. Vol. vii., 324. 



226 THE GREAT MOTHER 

nix seeks this world, where death reigns. Full of years, she 
directs her swift flight into Syria, to which Venus herself has 

given the name of Phoenice No food is appointed for her 

in our world, nor does any one make it his business to feed 

her while unfledged She is an offspring to herself, her own 

father and heir, her own nurse and always a foster-child to 
herself. She is herself indeed, but not the same, since she 
is herself, and not herself, having gained eternal life by the 

blessing of death O bird of happy lot and fate, to whom the 

god himself granted to be born from herself!" Thus, the 
Great Mother works. A key to an understanding of her work- 
ing method as she reveals herself in Autumn is Pain. The Cos- 
mic Process in Autumn is Pain and the mystery of Pain: Death 
and Salvation. In Spring, Mother Nature marries herself with 
joy. In Autumn it is with Pain. In the Spring young people's 
fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. In the Autumn stern 
reality turns thoughts to sacrifice. "A marvellous thing truly 
is the mystic marriage of Nature with herself: the relations 
which, in our minds, intimately unite the most different parts 
of the great whole — the animate with the inanimate, the visible 
with the invisible, matter and spirit; and in each of these 
spheres a being with another being. This unity, this universal 
harmony, is instinctively revealed to all minds."* Only in the 
distance do most people see the self-inherent elements of Sal- 
vation. Their view of the Cosmic Process may be expressed in 
the words of Huxley:** 

"Natural knowledge tends more and more to the conclusion 
that all the choir of heaven and furniture of the earth are the 
transitory forms of parcels of cosmic substance wending along 
the road of evolution, from nebulous potentiality, through end- 
less growths of sun and planet and satellite; through all varie- 
ties of matter; through infinite diversities of life and thought; 
possibly through endless modes of being of which we neither 
have a conception nor are competent to form any — back of the 
indefinable latency from which they arose. Thus the most ob- 
vious attribute of the cosmos is its impermanence. It assumes 



* Alex. R. Vinet : "Outlines of Philosophy and literature," page 508. 
** "Evolution and Ethics, and Other Essays," page 50. New York, 1894. 



THB GREAT MOTHER 227 

the aspect, not so much of a permanent entity as of a changeful 
process, in which naught endures save the flow of energy and 
the rational order which pervades it." 

The Dance Month By Month* 
December 

December is the year's Sabbath of the fields. It is a day of 
rest and a day of retirement into self. For once — only for 
once — Mother Nature seems to stand still. That is to say, she 
works a little slower in some of the many chambers of her pal- 
ace. In the exceedingly cold and hot rooms she does not vary 
her methods very much. But in her midregion, in the sphere 
where her pulse beats strongly, and where she observes a month- 
ly vibration, she has instituted a time for Sabbath; a time for 
retirement unto reflection and she has excluded fruitfufness. By 
so doing, our kind hearted Mother, always bent upon teaching 
us, shows us the primitive order of Nature, the joyous idyllic 
life. To be sure, most of us do not thank her for the cold 
hands of hers which lead us, or for her frosty breath; but that 
is our fault, not hers. If we had not exhausted the elixir of 
life, with which she filled our blood and nerves during eleven 
months, we would not feel cold. Her design of a Sabbath is 
a wonderful gift, but like most of her other gifts, it is ignored or 
spurned. The Sabbath is designed for the soil as well as for 
man. We are pilgrims and strangers on Earth. We do not be- 
long here. During the Sabbath of December the cosmos cries 
aloud to tell us that we are only guests. Instead of listening to 
the lesson that comes in the storm, the cold and the snow, we 
hide away and fasten the doors securely, and come out in the 
Spring no wiser, and unfit for the lessons of rejuvenescence. 
The winter-gospeller shall not try to give Beauty for ashes — he 
can not do it. Let him bring out Beauty from ashes, or the in- 
nermost of the human heart that beats in the Great All, and all 
shall then "see salvation." The innermost in us feels all things 
as omens and signs. It joins the Holy Assembly of all these 
powers, animate and inanimate, which sing the perpetual Halle- 



* These articles 011 the months are digests from my articles in "The Word," Oct., 
1912-13, but with many new Thoughts added. 



228 THE GREAT MOTHER 

lujah. The face of death in the sun of life is the cup out of 
which it drinks its Christmas cheer. On the Winter stage of its 
way it surrenders its Summer clothes and puts on the garments 
of the essential life. To those who live disorderly, Gea, Mother 
Earth, in December means Giant Despair. But to those who 
live in rhythm and measure and by number, she is an artist 
without comparison. No artist brings out mysteries so marvel- 
ous as those the Mother draws upon our bedroom windows. They 
are not wonderful adornments only. Why is it that she always 
draws forest images and never anything like houses or other 
artificial human products? She does not draw Animal figures 
She has a preference for luxurious curves, wild and spontaneous 
life ; curly tresses of women, tendrils, all those chaste lines which 
are a despair of Art, but a glorification of virtue and Beauty. 
She never approaches anything like a sensual line. Her stylus 
is solemn and ritualistic. Why thus? perhaps it is her geom- 
etry. I think it is. All the contrarity and apparently lost har- 
mony of December can be seen and heard by the attentive eye 
and ear and by the Inner-Life, and a little observation. For 
instance, strike the keys of a piano as if by accident, and you 
hear a great crash ; but if you watch, you will notice how the dis- 
cordant sounds die away in a final vibration which is no longer 
a jarring noise, but a soft and pleasing tone. Similarly Nature 
brings harmony out of discord and softens rude noises. In the 
Open this may be studied in December. This method of har- 
mony is one way in which the Great Mother erects the Gate 
Beautiful. In December new life is booming in the woods and 
all the branches are full of Spring prophecy. The naked arms 
reaching up are whistling Mother Nature's simple melodies, at 
the same time they are wrapping the young buds with gums to 
prevent the frost from destroying the life. The trees sing 
their Jubilate as loudly as they do in any monastery at Christ- 
mas time. Mother Nature is in her holy temple among the 
cliffs and in the valleys in December as much as in any other 
month. "Let all the Earth keep silence before her." There is 
less sweetness in her Winter sanctuaries, but more sanctity. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 229 

January 
If we 

"Go forth under the open sky, and list 
To Nature's teachings" 

» 

and do not fear the dull, leaden sky or the barren and dreary 

Landscape, but follow the frostbound roads, or tramp across 
the crystal-laden grass in the meadows, we shall soon discover 
that January is the month for head-people, for those high-minded 
souls who think and who make their beginnings by thought Janu- 
ary is especially a revelation of that subtle something we call 
Thought. It is easy for anybody to look beautiful when dressed 
up in clothes made by others, and it is charming to indulge in 
Summer's fancies, but only few can stand forth without fear 
as the trees do in the Winter and in January, revealing their 
true contour. How many dare call out with Southey: "Come, 
melancholy Moralizer, come!" The rich birch dares do it; its 
gentle delicacy proves a fine and deep interior. The oak, too, 
can proudly show its rugged grandeur and point to persever- 
ance as an element of attainment. The elm can vie with the 
birch and the oak and enjoy its beautiful ramification and sug- 
gest courtly grace. These trees are thought- forms which the 
Great Mother can best show in Winter. When the leafy dress 
is removed the truth is shown. How pensive is not the spruce ; 
it is not asleep or sunk below the threshold of consciousness. 
Like thought, it enjoys the clear cold air of bracing January. 
Even if "Janiveer freeze the pot upon the fier," as the English 
country people say, the spruce and all its relatives are wide 
awake and ready to tell us that they saw Light before any of the 
leafy trees and that their office is to show the eternal life of 
thought. Capricorn and Aquarius divide January between them, 
and they are, some Occultists say, the knees and ankles of the 
Great Mother, which signifies usefulness. The Mother's sym- 
bol of usefulness in January is the little moss. Brilliant as is 
the grass silvered with hoary vine, it can not compare in useful- 
ness to the mosaics of mosses spread wherever Mother Nature 
is not interfered with. It is by means of the mosses that she 
makes soil in January. When the rocks crack for one reason or 
other, the mosses which hold the melting snow, let the stream 



230 THE GREAT MOTHER 

into them and when the Water freezes there, it breaks off small 
particles of rocks, the first elements of future soil. In among 
the fragments come the bacteria and they make it porous. Bac- 
teria also dig down when Jack Frost has loosened the top lay- 
ers of the soil; by so doing they make it porous and airy. 
Mother Nature thinks of all such things in January, though men 
call it a "dead season" and cry about "sore times." Let us 
learn that the Great Mother keeps the doors open to her museum 
of Nature all Winter and that even freezing showers and black 
frost are her blessings. 

February 

February has its own marks and was singled out by the an- 
cients. February derives its name from februa or "means of 
cleaning" such as for instance pieces of wool distributed at 
the feast of lupercalia, the yearly ceremony of cleaning, not 
only the houses but also, for instance, the unfruitful women, 
who at this time were chastened by the priests for their weak- 
ness, by being whipped with leather straps. This brutal idea 
connects the custom with the conception "the hearth." But 
February also means purification in other senses. In this month 
fall the Church's "Candlemas and Lent," and in more than one 
sense they mean preparation for the coming Spring. In Feb- 
ruary also comes Valentine's day with such ideas as Hymen, 
cupids, 

"Sad weather now declines 
Each bird doth choose a mate." 

February is the month of the hearth. A lair or a resting place 
are fundamentally the same as a hearth. Man's resting place 
or home, as we call it at times, has of course, its own peculiari- 
ties and in those it differs from the Animal's quarters, but 
essentially it is a habitation for protection against weather and 
enemies, and a centrality for his family and property. When 
man's abode assumes a romantic character the special fireplace 
becomes the hearth or the ideal place it holds in stories and 
tales and thus gives a character to man's domicile, which a lair, 
a den, or a nest can not have; nor can a camp, a cavern, or a 
tent represent the hearth and its idea. All these places suggest 



THE GREAT MOTHER 23 1 

a sojourn, not a maternal home. The true home or family 
hearth is most characteristic of man. On one side it is mind 
and the other it is Nature. Home and marriage are necessarily 
of a social character; they develop domestic virtues, and mutual 
helpfulness. And in these traits they point to that Universal 
Brotherhood which has always been the dream of mankind and 
the hope of romance. The hearth as a home type represents the 
actuality of all desires, thought, love and aspiration. 

The word "hearth" connects with "erda," the earth, and thus 
becomes a direct emblem of the Great Mother and her Presence 
within man's dwelling. The baking of bread is one of the main 
symbols of a home. There is no home where bread is not baked 
— that is to say, a home in the old style. The rudiments of civ- 
ilization and home life are first found when bread baking begins. 
People who live simpl)'- on fruit have not yet settled and come 
under the forms of civilization. No family hearth exists among 
them. The Animals bake no bread and those who live always in 
public places have no idea of bread "as the principle in which 
all things stand together." 

March 

In spite of many contradictory marks, people will insist upon 
calling March the first Spring month. As regards their mean- 
ing, they are rarely correct if the first part of the month is 
considered. They are more often right in the last half. To 
speak of March as Spring in the sense of delight and joy, is not 
to speak correctly but that is the way people speak. I have 
already spoken of Spring and pointed out Spring signs in De- 
cember. I have not been far astray. Spring begins when the 
sun comes above the equator and starts in to stimulate all or- 
ganic existence. It is true, as Thoreau remarked: "No mortal 
is alert enough to be present at the first dawn of Spring." Be 
it so, that no mortal has the key to Nature's Spring mystery, it 
is nevertheless a fact that the days we call March are Spring 
days; that is to say, they are manifestations of that "fighting" 
energy, the classical people personified and called Mars. The 
beginning "frog-talk," the mare's shedding her coat on your 
dress, the bright colors, are March's striking Mars' bucklers 
and calling for the Dance of life. In these signs there are many 
16 



232 THE GREAT MOTHER 

of February's mystic and melancholic characteristics. They are 
seminal, noisy and sometimes licentious. War in Nature's sense 
means aggressiveness, push, quickening. War also means de- 
struction, but in Nature's sense such a destruction means re- 
casting the old into something new. As a destroyer and yet a 
restorer, Mars and hence March is symbolized by a staff or a 
spear. The sword cuts asunder, but when the wound is healed 
harmony is found to have been born. Such is the story of the 
love of Mars and Venus, properly read. Homer gives us a pres- 
entation of Mars (Ares) which is most interesting and which 
can be readily seen in the temper of the month. In point of 
strength he is divine, but in point of mind and heart he is be- 
low even man, he is Animal. He is a compound of deity and 
brute. Seen in the characteristics of the month, we readily dis- 
cover him in his boisterous animal energy and always in wild 
actions and senseless doings. March is "storm and stress"; the 
desire to "get out"; to break a bondage; to enlarge oneself; to 
multiply oneself by sex and by mind. But March has no phil- 
osophic understanding and method. March is quite fairly per- 
sonified by Mars, the god, the soldier. To be called a Mars 
or a son of Mars is no compliment ; it means no more than being 
a blinded bull insensibly rushing on. Every March the Great 
Mother sends a unique form of dizziness over the world and her 
human children feel her grip upon their hearts in peculiar 
ways. She tests their strength for new roles she intends to dis- 
tribute. The sluggish heart which does not give Spring glory to 
the Water drop upon the grass straw nearest to it, will not be a 
banner bearer of the new life. Dry bodies, withered souls and 
unmoved spirits, take secondary parts in the new play, and in 
another year no part at all. 

Every March the Great Mother delivers at least one lecture on 
the Mysticism of life. Browning must have heard such a lec- 
ture. In a stammering fashion he has reproduced some of it 
in his Paracelsus. We learn the idea of her lecture from Para- 
celsus at Constantinople, in the house of the Greek conjurer. 
Paracelsus has failed to find the Great Mother, because he sought 
knowledge at the sacrifice of love. In so doing he violated a 
natural law and is suffering for it. Knowledge and love are in- 
separable in life. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 233 

Five years later we find Paracelsus at Basle opening his heart 
to his old friend, the professor, at the university. Outwardly 
Paracelsus has "attained," yet he feels his failure. He has con- 
tented himself with lower aims in order to be useful. And that 
is not Truth. He has t also drawn around him a lower kind of 
men, and that has produced a false position. We hear Paracel- 
sus exclaim: 

No! No! 

Love, hope, fear, faith — these make humanity ; 

These are its sign and note and character, 

And these I have lost ! 

This is the Mother's March lecture : 

Love, hope, fear, faith — these make humanity ; 
These are its sign and note and character. 

April 

In his Fasti, Ovid tells us that April is Venus' month. After 
the following passionate outburst, "There are some, O Goddess 
Mother, who would rob Thee of the honor of this month and who 
begrudge Thee April," he speaks as follows: "April, the Great 
Mother, having laid her hand upon it, claims it as her own. She 
indeed most worthily holds sway over the whole circle of the 
year; she owns a sovereignty inferior to that of no deity. She 
rules the heaven, the Earth, and the waves that gave her birth; 
she it was who created all the gods; she furnished the primary 
causes for the Plants and the trees. She it was who brought 
together the untaught minds of men, and instructed them to 
unite, each one with his mate. It was she who first divested man 
of his savage habits of life; from her were derived the arts of 
dress, and the careful attention to the person. By means of her 
were a thousand arts first touched upon and through the desire 
of pleasing, many things were discovered which before lay con- 
cealed. Can anyone be found to dare to deprive this goddess 
of the privilege of giving her name to the month of April? 
And no season is more becoming to the great goddess than the 
Spring ; in Spring the Earth is beautiful ; in Spring the soil is un- 
bound — " April has more peculiarity than any other month. The 
season is inspired with energy of the Whole, is brainy, is educat- 



234 THE GREAT MOTHER 

ing in character ; that is, the Great Mother leads our thoughts into 
largeness, into the Open. We breathe suggestions, we tremble 
with germinations and growth. We move in rhythms that have 
Fire in them. There is a new melody in our blood; it is moody, 
passionate and at times despairing. The music lacks unity and 
is therefore wanting the man's principle of Beauty, but it is full 
of secret meaning and it quickens the intuitions. April is not 
of the home-keeping order; it is full of fancy for adventure; 
its Mysticism is of the outgoing order, it is not introspective. Its 
Occultism deals with the Great Mother's fluid expressions. It 
does not talk about crosses and crucifixions, but about the heart 
of man and its longings. Soon it will be discovered that April 
showers have intoxications in them. 

April awakens memories everywhere as abundantly as it calls 
out the new growth. But the Great Mother softens the grey and 
tearful memories by illuminating them with warm Air. She 
smiles upon paleness, and bright days give hope and encourage- 
ment. Sad memories are washed in influxes of courage, and 
wails of despair are lost in the vast circulation of life. 

May 

Everywhere the Great Mother's smiles are full of blessings 
and promises in May. She makes this month a "merry month" 
with bird song and exhortations from the newcomers in many a 
nest. The frogs "sing" or call or croak, which is the technical 
word? "Singing" is a better term after all, because their voice 
resounds in simple love of life. Let those who doubt it listen 
to them on a warm starlit night. Frogs and wild flowers laugh 
in Springtime and voice the Mother's desire better than cathe- 
drals. If you listen and are humble enough, you can hear the 
Great Mother's laugh throughout all organic creation and see her 
vigor in the swelling breasts, full of life's nectar. She indulges 
her own nature and empties the cup without fear of intoxication. 
She knows not what intoxication is. She is always a master in 
balance. Her balance does not mean immobility. In May she 
swings between joy and tears, ups and downs, and is not partial 
to either. In the morning she may rush forth with much vigor 
and fly her banner of hope. In the evening she may feel de- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 235 

pressed by the mightiness of her own strength and the greatness 
of her self-imposed tasks. But in the night she recovers herself. 
May and June nights are peculiarly able to restore balance, not 
only for youths who go out "to find the May dew," but also for 
the Great Mother herself. The generous warmth of darkness 
is redemptive. In darkness we go back behind all phenomena 
and manifestations and can bathe in the abyss. This is a mystery 
to the uninitiated. Various peoples have expressed their under- 
standing of May in their manners and customs. The Kelts had 
their Beltein, the Romans their Floralia, and the English their 
Maypole, and the "bringing home the May," their "going-a-May- 
ing." The May pole was also known in ancient Mexico. All 
meant to honor the Great Mother : 

" the fay rest may'd on ground, 



Deckt all with dainties of her season's pryde, 
And throwing flowers out of her lap around." 

In the Zend Avesta the resurrection is typified by the image 
of a young maiden coming to meet "the pure man.". She comes in 
a sweet-scented wind and is "beautiful, shining, with shining arms, 
one powerful, well-grown, slender, with large breasts, praise- 
worthy body ; one noble, with brilliant face ; one of fifteen years, 
as fair in her growth as the fairest creatures." The phenomen- 
ology of May and the Mother is something like this : Up to May 
Day the Great Mother is the giant of eld, a mystery to herself. 
She lives retired and with eyes closed, but she is wonderful in 
universals. In those days she lives the Inner-Life in a self-con- 
centrated way we men can not realize, nor even find an image 
for. She will not have us know her secret. When May comes, 
she shows her temper and she revels in "going out"; she then 
shows us a many colored garment merely to suggest the soul 
and to mark the lines of her physiognomy, that we may guess 
her thoughts and also in the endeavor to penetrate us and create 
a consciousness of her. Her colors are parallels and correspon- 
dences to the laws of our reason. They are one of her many 
languages, and addressed especially to minds below the line of 
consciousness, but their theme is the light-sense and they awaken 
spirituality. Get into the habit of looking upon color as so many 



236 THE GREAT MOTHER 

unblinking eyes and my reader shall discover Presences behind 
these eyes or colors and that they are the Great Mother's initia- 
tions. Colors are full of enchantments, but only for the faith- 
ful ones. The stones keep their secrets to themselves when the 
noisy ones are about, and the trees hide their loves that the im- 
pure shall not see them. There is no magic in the colors of the 
moonbeams except to the hands that we keep outstretched to- 
wards them. The colors of May answer all quests for the In- 
finite and they interpret life. The month of May was in ancient 
times the month of a goddess, Bona Dea. Bona Dea is not a 
name, but only a designation of a mysterious deity whose real 
name was not known, even if she had one. Whatever she was 
mystically, this is certain, that she was a protective deity of the 
female sex, a shy and unknowable deity of fertility. 

June 

If my object were merely to find an expression for the organic 
life in June, such as I could write in- Nature's calendar, I would 
simply borrow this from the poet: 

"Whether we look or whether we listen, 
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; 
Every clod feels a stir of might, 
And instinct within it that reaches and towers 
And, groping blindly within it for light, 
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers. 
The cowslip startles in meadows green, 
The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, 
And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean 
To be some happy creature's palace ; 
The little bird sits at his door in the sun, 
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, 
And lets his illumined being o'errun 
With the deluge of summer it receives " 

But June is characterized by peculiar human notes. In June 
and July a great number of people come in personal contact with 
Nature, which they know nothing about the rest of the year in 
the peculiar way of the Summer. It is not only the uninstructed 



THE GREAT MOTHER 237 

masses which have an awakening to Mother Nature's doings 
and life, even the scientists and philosophers come under the 
spell of an undying impulse in humanity. All classes rush into 
the country, not only to get fresh milk, fruits and good food, 
but also to clothe the dry bones of reason with fresh ideas. And 
city folk need it. They know nothing about the immanent deity 
calling aloud in every color and offering the sacramental wine 
in every flower cup. They have, perhaps, seen a mountain, but 
never felt the self-assertive character of one. On a Sunday 
afternoon they may have crossed a lawn in a park or played 
croquet on one ; but ask them about plains, steppes, prairies and 
similar wonderful faces of country, and they do not know what 
you talk about. Their thoughts measure by inches not by miles. 
None of the city people who stray into the country can say 
honestly and out of a full heart : O mother Earth, by the bright 
sky above thee, I love thee, O, I love thee! 

What is Nature ? What is the call which in June comes to the 
undying yearnings of the human heart? The call is to be distant 
with men sometimes, to take interest in other things than man- 
kind's affairs, even when these affairs are of a higher order. 
Shun the preacher in the Summer time, in June and July. Fall 
back into Mother Nature's profounder silences. Recover the 
family connection with stones, trees, and running brooks. They 
have much to tell about origins ; they are full of the sense of the 
Infinite; they serve in the ministry of Beauty and sing psalms 
they have heard where the mountains strike roots, and the earth's 
inner warmth teaches the Great Mother's Bible lessons. In June 
the Mother withdraws her inspirations from bricks and stone- 
yards, and suggests savagery. She can be savage herself. The 
Great Mother starts new developments several times a year, but 
perhaps none of them are more interesting than the one in June, 
Summertime. In June we can see the meaning of all her work 
since Spring. June means accomplishment. In June the Mother 
also gives lessons in imaginations, Aspirations and ethical earnest- 
ness, as in no other season. Away from the city the soul is more 
sensitive to the larger appeals of Nature. At sunrise there is a 
widespread religious consciousness in the air, and during the day 
there is poetry under the shades of the trees. In all there is As- 
piration and impulses. June is particularly synonymous to 



238 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Motherliness ; not so much to gestation and nursing as to loving 
care, to sympathy and to devotion. In June the Great Mother's 
care is about the fruit, its protection against injury and its free- 
dom to grow and develop its true character. All disturbing in- 
fluences check its character and may even destroy. The fruit 
is as sensitive as nervous children. Adverse conditions sap the 
strength of both. The gentle winds of the hot days therefore 
whisper about self-protection. The key to the season's outdoor 
philosophy is Quietism. Quietism, as the Mother teaches it, means 
self-trust, privacy, and nourishment, such as generous air and soil 
may give it. Quietism fosters congeniality and companionship. 
June Quietism is second birth, awakening to individuality and a 
sense of our true estate. A look into a full blown rose suggests 
ideas that connect with that which I said above, about the month 
of June being synonymous with motherliness and Quietism and 
distance from men. Those ideas appear also to be the reasons 
why the rose is dedicated to the Virgin. St. Dominic instituted 
the devotion of the Rosary with special reference to those ideas. 
If Juno were not the goddess of the month, an antique god- 
dess of similar character was it. That seems clear from Ovid. 
At any rate, the month of June has a feminine character. I call 
June the month of the Great Mother and can understand why 
her color is yellow orange. 

July 

June and July have a double character according to the way 
we live. In pure subjectivity they are "love and emotions" 
and "domestic" or as astrology says maternal and active. But 
objectively July as Summer is apt to be tyrannical. The Great 
Mother may blind our eyes with too much Light or smite us with 
an excess of Heat. The dusty roads and the torrid Air almost 
strangle us ; the insects torture us both night and day. The lakes 
look placid, but they are often only stagnation and numerous 
watercourses have disappeared. The Air lying still does not mean 
repose, but rather indifference to life. The face of the Landscape 
otherwise so eloquent with the Great Mother's emotions, seems 
untouched like the pyramids and the columns at Abydos, yet 
the everlasting Sphinx is there. Back of this objectivity such as 
it appears to the casual observer lies something terrible, "the im- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 239 

perious call of the wild." Something we call craftiness is a 
characteristic of July. The Great Mother allows the arrogant 
and blustering city man to affront her for awhile. She lets him 
attempt to cross the desert without a guide and remains deaf to 
his call for help when he discovers his folly. She may not have 
a guard ready to save the foolish swimmer beyond his depths 
or in the tumultuous breakers. Astrologers call July the month 
of Leo, ferociousness, fire, thunder, etc., and rightly. The month 
is fiery, fiery with "flaming swords" both within and without, and 
these are always terrible to the weak, the cowardly and insincere. 
But they are redemption to the strong. Without intensity no 
character. Without Summerheat, no ripening of the crops. The 
Light may blind the eye, but Summerlight reveals trees, for in- 
stance in contours which Winter is impotent to produce. It is 
not because the tree is leafy that it looks differently; it stands 
forth in an attitude as if it were arguing with the spirit of the 
Air, protesting and asking for mercy for its youngest Leaves. 
Trees are more personal in Summer than in Winter. There is 
much thunder in Summer which means argument, extremes, self- 
assertiveness. Who rules? Do we or does the Great Mother? 

August 

August is an open secret ; the crops prove the meaning of ges- 
tation and growth and vintage brings joy that the child is born. 
But while there is termination written everywhere, it does not 
mean finality or end to the Great Mother's activity. On the 
contrary she is as busy as ever in all her creatures. A walk in 
the Open will soon show that the Mother has beginnings even in 
August. The young brood is learning the first lessons in inde- 
pendence. The seamew flies and dives by itself and away from 
the mother. The woodchuck knows who the mink is and does 
not stray too far away. The everlasting song of Nature is heard 
as much as ever, not only in the rude accents of the Mother's 
human children, but especially on the sea shore, where the 
screaming multitudes of seabirds have taken up the refrain last 
heard of in the woods and more sonorously than now. The 
reflective thoughts of September begin in August. The month 
invites to retirement, to serenity and contemplation. Contempla- 
tion is a beholding rather than thinking in syllogisms. The men- 



24O THE GREAT MOTHER 

tal movement comes to us rather than starts with us. The things 
and their essential qualities force themselves upon us. We do 
not take them and can not do it, even if we tried. August invites 
us to such schooling. The open space which lies upon the ocean 
and which looks upon us from out its immensity has the power 
to harmonize all dissonances preparatory to contemplation. They 
seem to stretch out a hand wishing to place us upon the sand 
ready for the teachings of the Great Mother. In the Autumn 
we are inclined towards these lessons. We are more sedate than 
in the Spring. In the Spring we have the quality of rivers and 
the onrush. In August we like to rest on the lake and prefer the 
calm and the peace of the wide Air. We fear the heaving deep. 
The Air is reflective, that is to say, it reflects the Great Mother's 
will. The reflection is a motion which can not be calculated 
physically. There is something of the Eternally Ongoing in 
it, which defies analysis. But it is no uncertainty; it is quite 
individualistic and definite. 

September 

September is philosophical.' It invites to sober reflections and 
to consider what we mean by the month of fruits, by purple and 
red, by ripeness" and profusion. "The goldenrod is still golden" 
but "the heart of the sunflower is darker and sadder." Is this 
the case because September means closing of Summer? And yet, 
perhaps no season shows the Great Mother's Landscapes more 
serene, especially towards sunset. Is the Landscape or her face 
so beautiful because "Queen September goeth by" as the poet 
sings ? September is silent, but not somber or sad. There is still 
music in all echoes. The Great Mother moves slowly and serenely 
because she is preparing new plans. Upon the atmosphere one 
may read her mind: "I aspire!" Those who read aright answer 
her back : 

"This world is no blot for us, 
Nor blank; it means intensely, and means good; 
To find its meaning is my meat and drink." 

October 

To speak of Nature is philosophical. To talk of the Great 
Mother is personal; and, it is theosophical to observe and study 



THE GREAT MOTHER 24I 

her Dance through the circle of the year. She dances in the 
round and she leads us in the Dance, though most of us do not 
know that we are carried around and around, through month and 
month, year after year, and, at last fall exhausted to the ground 
— to see again ? Yes ! , but how ? 

Watch her, the Great Mother! look at her in October. Just 
then she looks like a woman of forty-five to fifty or a little be- 
yond and yet she has all the characteristics of the young matron, 
who has changed her life from restless productivity to balance. 
She is recovering her physical form and restoring her shape. 
The Light is not direct and the heat rays are not blazing; they 
are slanting and less operative. The nights are even cool and 
spell indifference, silence and solitude. The days are serene 
though mostly of lovely golden hues. Showers are not needed, 
yet severe weather comes at times. The change of life creates 
occasional storms. The Great Mother changes her colors and 
her dress. The green chlorophyl which was her customary cos- 
tume during the Summer now disappears by transformation, and 
the red, purple or brown anthocyans take the place. "October 
may draw long lines of shadows on the pale cheek, but nutting 
enlivens the face. Nutting times the heart to celestial melodies. 
Nutting-time is the opposite of Spring fervor and lust. Nutting 
means immortality. 

November 

The harvests are garnered; the fields are bare, barren and 
murky; the soil is cold and the trees do not drink as freely as 
before. Everywhere the Great Mother wanders, looking for 
her lost daughter Proserpine. She herself shivers and the clouds 
that seem to follow her witness her tears. They are her only 
companions in sorrow. The ploughman does not sympathize, be- 
cause he is ignorant about the Autumn mystery. If he under- 
stood it, he would not swear at his horses, but would worship. 
Incessantly the Mother asks of the small creatures that have not 
yet sought shelter: "Where is that daughter of mine?" Neither 
the muskrat nor the beaver nor the bear can help her. The 
bereaved Mother knows that her daughter is in the underworld; 
but is she happy there? The Mother is feverish. The flush of 
red on the Leaves that still remain on the branches shows it. 



242 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Man calls it "the red fire" "the turning of the leaves" — yes, but 
they do not know the significance of that color. They are 
thoughtless and looking for show, like the crowd in the Roman 
amphitheatre, and always calling for blood. In the turning of 
the Leaves the Great Mother sheds her blood and her human 
children decorate their houses with it. What a perversion! 
Hallowe'en and Hallowmas are not merely a night and a day. 
They are everywhere where there is no dormancy, where Nature 
Mother does not keep some other children asleep. She has many 
mansions and many rooms. She visits them all in November 
and takes care of all her flock, but she cannot forget that one 
daughter, Proserpine; hence, where she comes at this season 
shadows fall before her, and the ignorant call them ghosts. In 
the month of November her human children have more psychic 
ability than in any other month, because their animal vigor, lent 
them for special purposes, is not wasted quite as much as at 
other times. Lucifer, the Light Bringer, one of her faithful 
attendants, is always busy in November. In the Spring he 
teaches how to continue life; in November he is engaged in in- 
structing how to improve it. Hence there is more introspection 
in November than in the Spring, when we look out and about 
and not up and in. Consequently, November is a good month 
to begin the Inner-Life. Most of us have felt the presence of 
the ancestral self awaken in the Spring. We have then quite 
often revelled in that uncontrolled and wild self which we have 
feared and condemned in reasonable moments. But, I think, 
only few observe that Aboriginal in the Autumn. But she is 
there, the savage Sakti-Durga ! Silently, furtively, she moves in 
us and the habits of the deer, the squirrel and the wild fowl 
testify against us in the courts of the spirit. We go hunting. 
The hunter is nothing but a savage, a carniverous animal. The 
hunter is an inverted man; he is a pagan and does not know of 
a wolf dwelling with lambs, or leopards lying down with kids or 
young children leading lions. Such a state is impossible, he says. 
He believes in cunning and blood, and blows his horn to tell the 
neighborhood that he has disturbed the cosmic order and is 
proud of it. But he is only an inverted man. He has used his 
superior possibilities for evil and not for good. November is the 
hunter's month as I have stated, but these hunters are not 



THE GREAT MOTHER 243 

Mother Nature's favorites. They do not hunt as she wishes them 
to do. They should follow the ways of Orion, who arises at this 
time and who is the most glorious of the constellations on the 
Northern Winter sky. This valiant hero fights the raging Taurus, 
followed by Cetus, the ^sea monster. He is human intelligence 
fighting ferocious and demonic forces which have torn them- 
selves loose from the Mother's guiding hand. 

Wild Nature, The Early Christians and the Great Mother 

By wild Nature I understand such Nature as is unaffected by 
man and which is by man called useless, confused, terrible, etc., 
though at the same time often called beautiful and romantic. 
Spots which man shuns or has shunned in the past, savages feel 
hold beings, beneficent or maleficent. It would seem that such 
places could not be loved by man, yet in our own day we talk 
about love for wild Nature. Love for wild Nature is modern 
and I see in it a revelation. There has been sporadic cases of 
love for the wild, and I will mention several. In the past it was 
an instinct that led men into the wild; an instinct, a perception 
of Beauty, which was unconscious. It is not before Christianity, 
but after it had opened human nature to us, that we found that 
family-likeness and communion which we now may have. Chris- 
tianity created a special temperament ; it exalted the feelings and 
called man out of himself and his social environment into what 
appeared "the real world." While the new doctrines emphasized 
the soul and the value of the soul, they also created a longing 
for new habitations, for surroundings which give that Freedom 
the soul longs for, and, that Freedom was found in the Mother's 
greater temples among the mountains and in the deserts. St. 
Jerome for instance writes to the monk Heliodorus : "O desert, 
blooming with Christ's flowers! O Solitude, from which are 
brought the stones to build the Apocalyptic City of the Great 
King ! O familiar retreat delighting in God ! How long will you 
let the houses press you down? How long will you shut your- 
self up in the prison of smoky cities ? Believe me, I know noth- 
ing more brilliant than the light here. Here one lays aside the 
burden of the body and flies up into the pure and splendid 
aether." 



244 TH 3 GREAT MOTHER 

There is here no special aesthetic expressions, such as we hear 
them later, but there is that joy which the newborn souls felt in 
their retreats, and, any one who has a romantic vein and is in 
an exalted psychic condition knows the Freedom which comes 
with that joy. 

St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, in the third century wrote 
against "Public Shows" and contrasted them with the shows of 
Nature, such as sunrise and sunset, the waxing and waning 
moon, the seasons, the troops of stars, the heavy mass of the 
Earth balanced by mountains, the rivers and their sources, the 
seas with their waves and shores, the mere Air, and in the Air 
the birds, in the Water the fishes, on Earth man. "Let these, I 
say, and other divine works, be the exhibitions for faithful 
Christians. What theatre built by hands could be compared 
with such works as these? Though reared with immense piles 
of stones the mountain crests are loftier; though the roofs glit- 
ter with gold, they will be surpassed by the brightness of the 
starry firmament." 

Even St. Augustine, who perverted so much of the original 
teachings of Jesus, has enthusiasm for the sea for instance. He 
had crossed it often and gazed on it from the harbor at Car- 
thage. His immense passions understood Nature's wildness 
and he probably heard the Great Mother's voice many times, but 
his turbulent soul was too occupied with his own thoughts to 
be able to interpret what he heard. Just such men as St. 
Augustine hold abilities which make it possible for the Mother 
to reveal herself. But the clock of Nature had not yet struck 
the hour of day, when he lived. He wrote (in his "City of 
God," towards the end) about the sea: "so grand a spectacle 
when it arranges itself as it were in vestures of various colors, 
now running through every shade of green and then becoming 
purple or blue!" — "Is it not delightful to look at it in storm?" 
Back of such joy, even if it is not purely aesthetic, we can feel 
a call for a Larger World. A similar tendency appeared in 
Seneca, when he wrote in his essay -on "Peace of Mind": "Let 
us make for Campania: now I am sick of rich cultivation: let 
us see wild regions; let us tread the passes of Brattici and Lu- 
cania; yet amid this wilderness one wants something of Beauty 
to relieve our pampered eyes after so long dwelling on savage 



TH3 GREAT MOTHER 245 

wastes: let us seek Tarentum with its famous harbor, its mild 
winter climate, etc." Immediately after he writes "as Lucretius 
says 'thus every mortal from himself doth flee.' " 

It has been shown* that it is remarkable how many of the 
most famous and sacred religious shrines of Christianity are sit- 
uated on places which suggest the modern love of the wild. 

No doubt the early Christians were still under the old influ- 
ences and traditions relating to "high places," etc. How could 
it be otherwise? Conversation changes one's psychology, but 
not one's learning. From their paganism they carried with 
them the meaning of high mountains, and their readings in the 
Old Testament did not change their beliefs. They remembered 
Sinai, Zion, Hermon and Carmel as well as Mt. Olympus and the 
numerous other mountains which had been "sacred" ever since 
primeval times. And about caves they thought like Seneca: 
"a cave eaten by time in the flank of a mountain fills the soul 
with the feeling of the existence of a high power" and they 
remembered Delphi, etc., and all the sacred springs. Being 
driven out of their contaminated environment by the Spirit of 
Newness and the Great Mother's silent admonishings, they 
followed their national and personal habits. The Spanish shrine 
of Montserrat was a temple before it became a Christian place 
of worship and was just such a place which Seneca speaks of 
with horror. Now it is one of the most fascinating spots in 
Europe and all the horrors of wild beasts and solitude are 
removed. Sainte-Baume, the cave in a rocky height, was ac- 
cording to legend, the secluded scene of Mary Magdalene's re- 
pentance. It is now considered a delightful and romantic spot. 
So is Rocamadour. It can not be accidental that the ancient 
Christian ascetics chose solemn and beautiful wild spots for 
their retreats. To find them and to locate them required almost 
superhuman endeavors in those days. There must be an aes- 
thetic impulse in Contemplation — and there is ! The contem- 
plative order of the Cisterciens in England has left the beau- 
tiful ruins of their abbeys in what now seem to us the most 
exquisite and romantic spots in the land, as at Fountains, at 
Furness, at Llanthony. But at the time of founding, the places 



* Havelock Ellis in " The Contemporary Review." 



246 the; great mother 

were horrible wildernesses, infested with wild beasts and they 
were far remote from men. When Tauler uses such a phrase 
as "the wilderness of the quiet desert of godhead" it seems evi- 
dent that he must have spoken under the influence of love for 
the wild and found in that phrase an expression for his realiza- 
tion of the godhead. The "spirit of wilderness" is a thought 
often recurring in mystic phraseology. It corresponds to that other 
of "darkness" of the Deity which has come down from the 
Areopagite and is a favorite expression used by the most con- 
templative and quietistic Mystics. There is an element of "wild- 
ness" in all asceticism; an unbounded desire to "get away" and 
"back," "way back" into the Unknown, into that Nature where 
no hypocrite can go and where the soul meets truth naked and 
face to face. Ascetics find their passion met when Wildness 
surrounds them. In their intensity they then become free. 
They are then alone with the Great Mother, whether they call 
her so or not. There is a tremendous power in the desert: a 
Presence not to be denied. When Renan wrote that the desert was 
monotheistic, he wrote better than he knew, but he had perhaps 
realized something of the Presence. In the desert Nature holds 
sway; man is powerless; art and science are helpless. Terror 
and magnificence rule. Wildness and desolation are normal 
conditions. Everywhere in the horizon rise forbidding mysteries 
and clouds of brooding evil threatening the traveler. Images 
of unknown vitality rise before his vision; they seem to spell 
to-day as they did in Jesu time "it is written." These images 
seem to be Mother Nature's Bible and to express the laws she 
has formed as a result of the life lived in ancient times and in 
the regions before they became deserts. The laws are funda- 
mentally the same now as they were then, but they act differently. 

The Arabs say: "In the desert one forgets everything; one 
remembers nothing no more." It is the power of Quietism which 
removes all that which belongs to the insincerity of civilization. 
For the "no-thing," the desert gives "the thing" in all its strength 
and truth. Eccleciastic Christianity does not admit that power in 
Nature. Only that Christianity which is the Inner-Life does. 

The early Christians who sought the Wilderness of the desert or 
of the mountains sought their places not for aesthetic reasons, 
though the places in most cases are most aesthetically situated. 



the; great mother 247 

They sought for solitude and for "new beginnings" with the 
Mother. They paid their respects to her by cultivating the 
ground and building temples to her honor. A lover of Nature 
can feel that to this day. In spite of all the history that clings to 
the places, it is still possible to feel the sacredness which clusters 
to the spot and a Nature-Mystic can have no doubt that the 
Mother delighted in the place and hence brought her devotees to 
it, that she there in seclusion might give them the mystic em- 
brace. A Nature-Mystic feels the Presence on such places and 
his sense of the Infinite is quickened. Rocks and roads, springs 
and caves give testimonies to the Most High Mother. The val- 
leys still sing for joy and the mountains lift the veil to let us 
behold Beauty. It seems natural to think that Francis of Assisi 
got the inspiration for his Hymn to the Sun from his mountain 
height at Verna, "his Tabor and his Calvary." There is an inti- 
mate relation between his asceticism and his feeling for Nature. 
With the Renaissance much of the early love for wild Nature 
was lost. Renaissance culture embraces some love for the wild, 
but that love is not a primary motive in life. Dante and Petrarch 
have feelings for the Landscape, but their feelings are those of 
poets, not that of lovers and wild men like hermits, ascetics and 
builders of monasteries. And so it was in France and England 
and elsewhere. With Rousseau dawns a new age. 

The Landscape and the Great Mother's Face 

Much has been written in our day about Nature-feeling and 
attempts have been made to show how the ancients looked upon 
the Landscape. It seems to me that all the writers have missed 
the main point. Did the ancients see the Great Mother's Face 
in the Landscape? Do moderns see it? Have they discovered 
that the Landscape 

Can give an inward help, can purify 
And elevate, and harmonize and soothe. 

Are they filled with 

The sense 
Of majesty and beauty and repose, 
A blended holiness of earth and sky? 
17 



248 THE GREAT MOTHER 

These two quotations are from Wordsworth. 

To him was given 
Full many a glimpse of Nature's processes 
Upon the exalted hills. 

Wordsworth had something like "a foretaste, a dim earnest." 
The Great Mother's Face seems to appear when he describes him- 
self as "a portion of the tempest :" 

To roam at large among unpeopled glens 
And mountainous retirements, only trod 
By devious footsteps ; regions consecrate 
To oldest time; and reckless of the storm, 

while the mists 

Flying, and rainy vapors, call out shapes 
And phantoms from the crags and solid earth, 

and while the streams 

Descending from the regions of the clouds, 
And starting from the hollows of the earth, 
More multitudinous every moment, rend 
Their way before them — what a joy to roam 
An equal among mightiest energies ! 

The Mother's Face is clearly seen in this Ossianic Landscape. 
The lines, full of human feeling, are from Fingal ; 

Morna, most lovely among women, 
Why by thyself in the circle of stones, 
In hollow of the rock on the hill alone ? 
Rivers are sounding around thee ; 
The aged tree is moaning in the wind ; 
Turmoil is on yonder loch ; 
Clouds darken round the tops of Cairns ; 
Thyself art like snow on the hill — 
Thy waving hair like mist of Cromla, 
Curling upward on the Ben, 
'Neath gleaming of the sun from the west ; 
Thy soft bosom like the white rock 
On bank of Brano of white streams. 



il 



the: great mother 249 

Poets, preachers and essayists have been quoted on Nature- 
feelings and I need not repeat. Alexander Humbold and Alfred 
Biese can furnish any and all quotations needed for popular use. 

Modern Nature-Feeling 

Strong words these from Edward Irving* especially because 
they come from so strong a man, a man so full of Bible words 
and mind: 

"Nature is not in a state of ruin — : seeing it is not crumbling, 
nor unstable, nor covered over with dust of ages, but a fabric 
firm and orderly, fresh and beautiful, standing to its ancient 
constitutions, and fulfilling the intentions of its Creator. There 
is a mighty power, there is an infinite variety, there is an un- 
speakable grace in all its operations and productions; insomuch 
that it is ever stealing away the worship and the adoration of 
men ; and hath so charmed the minds of this scientific and tasteful 
generation, that by thousands, and tens of thousands, they are 
leaving the worship of Christ for the worship of Nature. And, 
though doubt there can be none, that in all its parts Nature is 
underlying the sore and grievous curse which was pronounced 
upon it after the Fall — yet it is not a decayed or decaying ruin, but 
a firm and enduring structure, constituted under strong and 
sure laws, which preserve themselves unbroken until this day. — 
(Nature) shadows forth the regeneration, the perfect condition 
of things yet to be, at present believed in, and hereafter to be 
manifested, which we call spiritual and eternal. — I believe God 
hath ordained Nature in its present form, and established it ac- 
cording to its present laws, for the single and express purpose of 
shadowing forth that future perfect condition into which it is 
to be brought; so that from man down to the lowest creature, 
and from the animated creation down to the lowest plant, and 
from the vegetable creation throughout the elemental and 
inorganic world, everything containeth the presentment of its 
own future perfection; hath been so constituted by God as to be 
prophetic thereof ; and is bearing a silent witness to the redemp- 
tion and restitution of all things which is yet to be; is in a state 
of travail and great sorrow, groaning and wailing till it be de- 



* Miscellanies from the collected writings of Edward Irving, London 1865. 



250 THE GREAT MOTHER 

livered of its immortal birth, in the day of the manifestation 
of the sons of God. And herein lies the proper meaning of the 
word 'Nature,' (natura, 'about to be born') that it is about to 
bring forth; not that it is anything, but that it is to become by 
bearing something. — The idea of the natural world, as being 
merely the promise of a birth, forms the basis of what is called 
'natural religion': which is not, as they define it, to discover a 
religion distinct from Christianity or revelation, but to show that 
Nature, or rather the culture of Nature's barrenness and the pro- 
motion of her well-being, is really a lower revelation, a prepara- 
tion for what hath been brought to light by Christ ; so that as Paul 
saith : 'the invisible things of God from the beginning of the 
world are clearly seen, even His eternal power and Godhead.' 
This idea also contains the link between all natural sciences and 
the revelation of our redemption, making Nature the handmaid 
of grace, and everything venerable in society to serve for the 
outward court of the Christian temple." 

Feeling for Nature or a joy in Nature for Nature's own sake 
is modern and finds its first typical expression in Rousseau and 
Goethe or, in Romanticism, speaking in a general way. The feel- 
ing is not inborn, but results from spiritual culture and the gen- 
eral expansion that is characteristic of human progression in the 
Occident. The Orient has remained stationary in this respect. 
That this feeling is a result of growth has been shown in much 
recent literature, such as for instance, Alfred Biese's books and 
the many collateral works it has called forth. Sakuntala shows 
us many beautiful descriptions and many approaches even to our 
modern ways, but, nevertheless, the background is too meta- 
physical to allow us to classify it with modern works in which 
love towards Nature is the dominant note. Homer speaks about 
Nature only in order to make comparisons to men and men's ac- 
tivities. The Greeks and Romans were city-people and not out- 
door men, hence Nature could be no more than a frame around 
their art and man. Horace loved his garden simply as a delight- 
ful resting place, but the sea was to him horror and fear. The 
old Norse people and the Germans were no city-people but out- 
door folks and lived as far as we know in intimate relation with 
Nature. In this intimacy rooted all naive feeling for Nature 
which shows itself with the Minnesingers and came to full flower 



the; great mother 251 

in the Middle Ages. Yet in all their references to Nature there" 
is no perspective ; only fore-ground, so to say. There is no sys- 
tematic view nor philosophy. Nor has their Art appropriated 
their ideas, excepting in Gothic architecture, perhaps. In the 
Norse Sagas there is hut little Nature description and always 
merely as setting for the story. Njals Saga is a good illustra- 
tion. 

But there is a decided progress from India till the Norse and 
German Middle Ages. The feelings have been developing; Na- 
ture experiences have multiplied and the minds expanded. The 
effects may be seen in the Renaissance period and in Petrarch 
and Dante for instance. Aeneas Sylvius, the later pope Pius II, 
has an open eye for lines in the Landscape and for details. Titian, 
born in the Alps, seems to have loved Nature in her grandeur 
and power. 

In Rembrandt, Ruisdall and finally Rousseau and Goethe we 
come to our own day, and, in Wordsworth we get Nature- Wor- 
ship and the recognition of a family likeness between Nature and 
Man. These features in the main I will dwell upon on the fol- 
lowing pages. These artists and authors are among Nature's poets, 
prophets and Mystics. The views these men give us are not only 
the results of cultivated reason but also the outcome of a return 
to spiritual sense. They are all singers of the glory of the Great 
Mother. Some of them she has taken into her lap for a caress, 
some she has kissed. She has guided the hands and stylus of 
some ; others she has directed by her eye. A few she has spoken 
to. 

Modern Individuality and Nature 

The modern spirit is unfortunately limitless individuality. It 
cares little for public spirit and patriotism. However it has re- 
lated itself to Nature and has created what is called "the modern 
feeling for Nature." It avoids systems and sighs for Freedom. It 
finds a companion in Nature and can with Ausonius cry out: 
"Rocks give answer to the speech of man, and his words striking 
against the caves resound, and from the groves comes the echo 
of his voice. The cliffs of the coast cry out, the rivers murmur, 
the hedge hums with the bees that feed upon it, the reedy banks 
have their own harmonious notes, the foliage of the pine talks in 



252 the; great mother 

trembling whispers to the wind: Nature has made nothing 
dumb." How much this sounds like our own Whitcomb Riley's 

"There is a song everywhere," etc. 

Nature-Worship* 

It is easy to see how a reverential attitude to Nature would 
rise. Take for instance this illustration. By accident or pur- 
pose primitive man dropped a few seeds in the soil. After 
awhile the seeds sprouted and in course of time the plant which 
arose out of one single seed sprouts out again and with many 
seeds, say for instance, a wheat corn with its manifold increase 
on the new plant. A marvel has come to pass ! Whence these 
many seeds and the consequent riches? Who did it? How can 
it be discovered? Why did it happen? These and numerous 
similar questions must have arisen in the mind of the primitive 
man and they arise now where there is intelligence. They re- 
mained unanswered to him and they remain unanswered to-day. 
They are a mystery, a Nature-Mystery. But they call out won- 
derment, awe and reverence. They illustrate Nature-Mysticism. 
Similarly the primitive man was puzzled to find his hearth Fire 
similar to the relentless sun and that the wind blowing in one 
direction could drive his skiff in either of two opposite direc- 
tions or across the river. And where did the river come from 
and what is that Something he called Water; the primitive man 
saw it not only in the river but saw it fall down from the 
Air. The Air itself, or, space as it appeared to be ; what was that 
and what did it say when the wind spoke? While he wondered 
at all this mobility, he himself rested on something that seemed 
solid and which was the meeting point of all the other phe- 
nomena. The Earth seemed even more mysterious than the other 
forces. Wonder and fear everywhere! The elements became 
his teachers, thought he did not realize it. He was overwhelmed. 
His teaching did not make him a philosopher and a free man. 
It made him what we call religious or reverential. It created 
Inner-Life out of Outer-Life and the two became one in a 
mystery. Nature- Worship is a life in two worlds at the same 
time: an outer world and an inner world. 



* Only modern Nature-feeling could have created such a poem as Whittier's " Nature 
Worship." (See my comment on it in my " The Inner-Life and the Tao-Teh-King.") 



the; great mother 253 

"Two worlds are ours — 
The mystic heaven and earth within, 
Plain as the sea and sky." 

Nature- Worship cultivates "the invisible things of God from 
the creation of the world (and they are) clearly seen, being 
understood by the things that are made." And how natural it is ! 
"Our northern natures can hardly comprehend how the sun 
and the moon and the stars were imaged in the heart of a Peru- 
vian, and dwelt there ; how the changes in these luminaries were 
combined with all his feelings and his fortunes; how the dawn 
was hope to him; how the fierce midday brightness was power 
to him; how the declining sun was death to him; nay, more, 
how the sun, the moon and the stars were his personal friends, 
as well as his deities; how he held communion with them and 
thought that they regarded his every act and word; how in his 
solitude, he fondly imagined that they sympathized with him; 
and how with outstretched arms he appealed to them against 
their own unkindness or against the injustice of his fellow- 



men. 



"He 



How natural is not the following invocation: 

Ye deities! who fields and plains protect, 

Who rule the seasons, and the year direct, 

Ye fauns — 

Ye nymphs that haunt the mountains and the plains 

Bring your needful succor. 

Leave, for a while, O Pan! thy loved abode, 

You who supply the ground with seeds of grain, 

And you, who swell those seeds with kindly rain, 

Be ye propitious 

hear and grant our prayers.** 

Nature- Worship becomes a natural act the moment the Na- 
ture-Mystic realizes that "the world is a Man, and Man is a 
world," — that, "the world is an idea of the self existing," — 
that, "the earth is all enchanted ground" — and especially this, 

* Help's " Spanish Conquest of America." 

* Virgil Georgies I. 



254 THE GREAT MOTHER 

that "the world is not and can not be separated from the sum 
of the substance of the mighty Goddess, the Great Mother. 
Nature is visible mind and mind is invisible Nature, hence the 
mystic mind readily sees the personality of these features and 
phenomena which are nothing but stupid facts to the ordinary 
mind. Nature is not symbolical but a real fact; not an illusion 
or suggestion, but all that which we realize and much more. 
Nature is not Maya or "mere appearance" and does not "stand 
for" something else. Nature is a life to be lived; a power that 
influences us, even a secret to be discovered. The Pagans, so- 
called, realized all this and even more keenly than we do and 
their poets expressed their experiences for them, not, however, 
in personifications, but in real poetic presentations ; presentations 
which were meant for prophetic images and religious incarna- 
tions. And these presentations had the power of life and have 
it still. The Gods of the ancients are the Ideas of Plato and 
the forces of Nature as science knows them. The Pagans, so- 
called, and the true man of to-day feel the Humanity of these 
gods, ideas or forces and both are as ready to-day as ever to 
worship. They know the truth of the statement of the Gita 
that "this world is not for him who does not worship." Those 
who have lost the power of worship face the gods as demons, 
as opposites in existence, as forces working contrary to their 
interests. They suffer and do not know why. 

Being, The Great Mother 

The god of Nature-Worship is primarily all that which lies 
in the Greek veiov, the Ground and Power of Existence. Next, 
that god is the worldordering Thought, reconciling the world 
to itself. In Nature-Worship both forms are found. The 
latter form, I have called the Personal and described as the 
Presence. 

Visions of the Great Mother 

In an address before the American Social Science Association, 
which met at Saratoga in 1883, P. C. Mozoomdar said, an- 
swering the question: What is Hinduism? — "It is a deep appre- 
ciation and insight into Nature. You have heard of the nat- 
ural scenery of India, the mountains, the rivers, the great for- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 255 

ests, in the midst of which the hermits and sages lived. Amid 
this scenery the Hindu gained an insight into natural forces. 
He penetrated into the life and soul of the universe. When he 
awoke in the mysterious dawn, he saw in the twilight the form of 
a mysterious person, and he called that person God. When the 
luminary of the day arose, the sun conveyed to him strange 
suggestions of another power, an eternal effulgence, which he 
called God. When he looked on the blue skies, he invested 
them with divinity. Thus, living in Nature, the Hindu lived in 
God. Superficial observers have accused our fathers of Nature- 
Worship, of idolatry. When the sun was addressed as Thou, there 
was a Sun within the sun that was addressed. When the heaven 
was addressed, the prophet spoke to the Lord of the heavens. They 
did not worship the forces as such, but as representations of an 
invariable reality. Lights and shades, dawns and births and 
deaths, all presented to them a great fact, a soul behind all 
souls, Brahm." 

This enthusiastic outburst also explains what Nature- Worship 
is and should remove all stigmas of superstition, etc. Those 
who rest in "revelation" lose the power of it, if they persist 
in denying the truth in Nature-Worship, the Mystic soul of 
things can not be theirs. 

Nature, or the Great Mother in Sufism* 

A Persian proverb says: "He needs no other rosary whose 
thread of life is strung with beads of Love and Thought." Love 
and Thought, i. e., heart and mind, will reach the Mother before 
the dull intellect has begun to consider the question. Love and 
Thought know that "the heavens declare the glory of God," 
that "day uttereth speech unto day," and that "the night show- 
eth knowledge unto night." Heart and mind shall see the "table 
of Her bounty spread far and near." With the Mystics, they 
shall be "immersed in the ocean of vision" and behold "the 
form of Her beauty." These quotations are drawn from poets 
and prophets of Moslem and the Law, but they are Sufi in 
character. We might as well have found them in the Gulshan 
I Raz, or in the Mesnevi, or written by Attar. In one word 



* Compare my article in The Metaphysical Magazine, April 1895. 



256 THE GREAT MOTHER 

they embody this sentence of the Desatir: (The world is) "like 
a radiation, which is not and can not be separated from the 
sun of the substance of the almighty God! the Great Mother." 
The same thought is also given in this anecdote: "Nanac, the 
Persian, lay on the ground, absorbed in devotion, with his feet 
towards Mecca. A Moslem priest, seeing him, cried: 'Base in- 
fidel ! how dar'st thou turn thy feet toward the house of Allah ?' 
Nanac answered 'And thou — turn them if thou canst toward any 
spot where the awful house of God is not.' " The Sufi preacher 
tells us this story to prove that Nanac was the true worshipper, 
and he might have added, in perfect accord with his philosophy : 
"He is a man of high understanding and noble aspirations who 
recognizes the Divine in the smallest things of the world :" a 
Nature-Worshipper. 

If we study Nature in such a spirit we are Sufis, and our 
philosophy has become religion. The Great Mother is the sub- 
ject of both philosophy and religion. True philosophy, as John 
Scotus Erigena said, is true religion; and true religion is true 
philosophy. The Sufi philosophy of the Great Mother is also 
expressed in this parable told by a sage fish to some fishes who 
wanted to know what water was : 

"O ye who seek to solve the knot! 
Ye live in God, yet know Him not. 
Ye sit upon the river's brink, 
Yet crave in vain a drop to drink. 
Ye dwell beside a countless store, 
Yet perish hungry at the door." 

The key to all these Sufi words is this thought, that Nature is 
instinct with Divine life ; that there is an "impress of the face of 
the Divine Mother upon the atoms of creation;" that Nature is 
no false similitude, nor crumbling and unstable and covered 
with the dust of ages, but a fabric firm and orderly, fresh and 
beautiful, standing to her ancient constitution and fulfilling the 
intentions of the Being who is the Soul thereof. More than that, 
Sufism sees in Nature a shadow of the coming regeneration, 
the perfect condition of things, which the human mind and heart 
long for. The Sufis are wiser than we. They keep constantly 



the great mother 257 

before their eyes the fact that Nature is "nothing" finished, but 
a constant Becoming {nose or, to be born), a revelation of the 
self-unfolding and self-manifesting Great Mother. Most West- 
ern students of Nature might follow this method; they would 
then be, as the Chinese Buddists say, "like a man who takes a 
lighted torch into a dark house; the darkness is dissipated, and 
there is light." Who can not read the Mother's heart in the 
following from Jellalladin: 

I am the whispering of the leaves, the booming of the wave ; 
I am the morning's joyous gleam, the evening's darksome pall ; 
I am the tongue and all it tells ; Silence I am, and thought ; 
I am the sparkle in the flint, the gold-gleam in the ore, 
Breath in the flute, the soul in man ; the preciousness in all. 

What do these words mean? They describe to us the transfor- 
mation in time and space of our Great Mother. She in the garb 
of Nature is continually "dying," as we call it, only to live again. 
Between these two, Death and Life, the Great Mother assumes 
innumerable different forms, remaining, however, essentially the 
same. Death is to Nature a condition of existence as much as 
Life is. Either of them, and all that lies between them, are only 
transformations of one and the same power. Behind these 
transformations Nature hides her secrets of growth, preparatory 
for other and higher degrees of existence. When she has com- 
pleted one round of life, she leaps to another; but in all her trans- 
mutations "she seeks herself, she conserves her own energy," 
which proves her essence. Thoughts like these lay hidden in the 
verses of the Sufi poet above quoted. He threw his whole per- 
sonality into his study, his philosophy, his religion; hence his 
vision. We must, according to him, become one with Nature if 
we will penetrate to the Great Mother. We must be strong, 
for she accepts no half-hearted lover. But only the pure are 
strong. The words of the lamented Professor E. H. Palmer 
are apropos here: 

"Steering a mid-course between the pantheism of India on the 
one hand, and the deism of the Koran on the other, the Sufi cult 
is the religion of Beauty, where heavenly perfection is considered 
under the imperfect type of earthly loveliness. Their principal 



258 THE GREAT MOTHER 

writers are the lyric poets, whose aim is to elevate mankind to 
the contemplation of spiritual things, through the medium of 
their most impressionable feelings." 

Sufism has been called Mohammedan Theosophy. It is a grand 
philosophy of the Mother. Its chief centre is Persia, but many 
Sufis are found in Egypt. It is difficult to state definitely who 
was the founder of Sufism. Like Neo-Platonism and most forms 
of Mysticism, its principles are inherent in man. Derwishes are 
Sufi initiates and prophets. The word Sufi is derived from the 
Arabic word suf, wool, in allusion to the dress adopted by the 
Derwishes.* 

A Hindu Religious Enthusiast on Nature** 

Many an Hindu has felt the Great Mother and knew what her 
Presence means, but few have been able to express themselves 
so that we of the Occident find pleasure in listening to them. 
Mozoomdar is a glorious exception. I have gathered some of 
his enthusiastic thoughts below. "The earliest process of divine 
inspiration is through Nature's medium. The later, fuller, higher 
revelation of the Spirit does not exclude Nature or supplant it, 
but discovers in it greater lustre, a deeper mine of spiritual 
analogy. When man's mind interprets Nature, the result is 
poetry, science, art. When God's Spirit interprets it, the result 
is prophesies and Scriptures. When Nature loses its inspiring 
power, humanity ceases to inspire, the Scriptures become dry 
records or mere moral stimulants, even the correspondence with 
the Indweller becomes every day fainter; spiritual death is the 
effect sooner or later. Every seeker of God must therefore retire 
at times into solitude within Nature's sanctuaries, that the Spirit 
of God may there speak to him through symbols which his own 
breath has called into being." — "The divine significance of Nature 
is as old as the religious records of the most ancient races, — nay, 
older; for it was there before man's faith and reverence could 
be embodied in any sacred writing at all. But the modern priest 



* Most of the above is from an article by myself in the Metaphysical Magazine. If 
my reader wishes to know more about Sufism, he is referred to the articles on 
Sufism in the International Encyclopedia, The Cyclopedia Americana and Concise Cyclo- 
pedia of Religious Knowledge ; they are all by me. Elsewhere I have also spoken about 
Sufism for instance in my "Sufi-Interpretation of Fitzgerald and Omar Khayyam." 
** P. C. Mozoomdar : The Spirit of God : The Spirit in Nature. Boston, 1894. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 259 

of Nature is simply 'disturbed with the joy of elevated thoughts,' " 
— "In the prophetic age the passion for Nature was a 
fierce, wild insight, a sort of periodic madness, in the fever of 
which things laid bare their innermost meaning. A flight of 
birds, or a gust of wind^, the flower of the valley or the veil of 
night, 'dark daughter of day,' or the light of dawn that 'wipes 
away darkness like a debt,' suddenly recalled to the seers mem- 
ories, responses, combinations, continuities, likenesses, which 
slumber in us all as strangely overlooked or half forgotten things 
of some by-gone birth. — Our conceits and calculations have ex- 
pelled the Spirit from what the Spirit has made; and in the 
throne of Providence speculation reigns and terrorizes. — 
Nature is a universal blank, or a stimulant of mild poetry. It 
inspires, at best, landscape-painting in colors or in words, if it 
inspires anything at all above prospecting for mines, enactment 
of forest laws, and the practice of sportsmanship. Be it so to 
the scientific Occidental, if it must. To us Eastern men the 
mystic ministry of the old Mother continues. She is still the 
grand apparition, instinct with living fires of actual God-presence, 
still the oracle that often resolves the perplexities of faith and 
conduct. The mountain is holy ground which recalls the asso- 
ciations of a thousand years, and awakes in the soul the spiritual 
raptures of revered ancestors. The ancient sanctuary still holds 
its presiding Deity, to whom every devout Aryan must make his 
pilgrimage. 'Creation's cup sparkles with the heavenly wine' in 
which the Persian Poet 'saw melted his rosary and all the holy 
names around it.' " 

"And are we to look upon Nature as a vanity, as a delusion, 
and a snare? Or must we look upon her face with wondering 
eyes, full of the light of love and trust, as the child looks upon 
the face of its mother for the first smile of imperishable love and 
the first lesson of unerring wisdom?" 

"This bright, marvelous, mysterious, haunted universe has no 
message for religion? The clouds still gather on Sinai, and the 
blooming bush at sunset burns with an unconsuming fire; but 
there is no Moses to approach them with reverent feet. The 
Voice, ('I am that I am') is silent forever. The rose-tree flow- 
ers in Shiraz, and the nightingale sings its wakeful song; but 



200 THE GREAT MOTHER 

there is no Hafiz, intoxicated with the wine of divine love, to 
behold the face of the Beloved. The abodes of snow on the 
Himalaya are holy, but deserted. In the dark, empty forests 
the Aranyaks are no longer uttered, our vast rivers roll in sol- 
itude, the lips of the Rishi are silent, the voices of devotee has 
died away. The world is losing faith, first in God's creation, 
and then in God." — 

"The Hindu doctrine of Maiya, or 'illusion,' does not mean 
that the objective universe is a dream, but that it is a disguise: 
it veils the Spiritual Being who pervades all things, and men 
are so far deluded as to believe that nothing exists except that 
which meets the senses." 

Mythology and the Great Mother 

Let it be understood at the outset that the ancient people and 
their poets did not believe in the many separate gods, which our 
mythologists tell us about. That individual persons mistook 
manifestations for the Great God was no doubt the case, but that 
does not change the fact, that the ancients worshipped a Supreme 
God and that they gave personal names to that Deity's mani- 
festations, such as for instance, Zeus-Jupiter to the heavens and 
at times also to the "power" of the heavens; Juno to the Upper 
Air; Demeter-Ceres to corn, etc. When I therefore in the fol- 
lowing speak of gods and goddesses, I speak of them as mani- 
festations of the one supreme power and the Supreme I call 
the Great Mother. By treating the subject that way I am in 
accord with the best modern judgments in the study of religion. 

They talk about being Christians. I would like to see a Chris- 
tian. Has there been any since Jesus? All are really heathens. 
And it is well that it is so. Heathenism is the Path to the 
Christ. When we become Christians we are taken away from 
this phenomenal world and sat in a larger place. 

All Nature-Mystics cry with Wordsworth: 

Great God ! I'd rather be 
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn, — 
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, 
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; 
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; 
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. 



the great mother 261 

They need not be ashamed of mythology. Mythology is a 
form of intuition and mystic insight; it is both science, poetry 
and philosophy and guided mankind along before these arose. 
Mythology spoke in personal terms; modern learning is im- 
personal, abstract and distant. Mythology was a joy of life: 

O fancy, what an age was that for song! 

That age, when not by laws inanimate, 

As men believed, the waters were impelled, 

The air controlled, the stars their courses held; 

But element and orb on acts did wait 

Of Powers endued with visible form instinct, 

With will, and to their work by passion linked. 

But moderns have lost the sense for mythology. The modern 
state is as described by Wordsworth, thus: 

The world is too much with us; late and soon, 
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers; 
Little we see in Nature that is ours ; 
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! 
The sea that bares her bosom to the moon ; 
The winds that will be howling at all hours, 
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers; 
For this, for everything, we are out of tune; 
It moves us not. 

The Great Mother is of course herself the primary object of 
mythology or the story of the Gods. She is called by many 
names as for instance 

The Great Mother, the Myrionymus* 

According to Mariette Bey, Isis was worshipped three thou- 
sand years before Moses. In India she was called Sacti; in 
Greece, Rhea, Demeter, Cybele, Hecate, etc. She is the Ishtar of 
Nineveh, the Astarte of Babylon, the Frigga of the Norsemen 
and Saxons, the Isa or Disa of the Teutons, the Mylitta of 



* Compare my article in The Metaphysical Magazine, February, 1895. 



262 the great mother 

Phoenicia, the Semele of Boeotia, the Maja of Thracia, and the 
Idsea of Creta. Everywhere she is the Good Mother — bona dea. 
She is styled "Our Lady," "Queen of Heaven," "Rose," "Star of 
the Sea," "Governess," "Earth Mother," "Tower," "Savior of 
Souls," "Intercessor," and "Immaculate Virgin," etc. Why 
should we call this absurd? A man of our own day, Earnest 
Renan, addressed her upon the Acropolis, thus : 

"Thou alone art young, O Kore ; thou alone art pure, O Virgin ; 
thou alone art holy, O Hygeia ; thou alone art strong, O Victory. 
The cities, thou watchest over them, O Promachos; thou hast 
enough of Mars, Area; peace is thy goal, O Pacific. Legisla- 
tress, source of just constitutions; Democracy, thou whose fun- 
damental dogma is that all good comes from the people, and 
that, where there is no people to cherish and inspire genius, 
there is naught ; teach us to extract the diamond from the impure 
mob. O Ergane, Providence of Jupiter, divine worker, mother 
of every industry, protectress of toil, thou art the nobility of the 
civilized laborer, and settest him so far above the indolent 
Scythian; Wisdom, thou to whom Zeus, after taking deep 
thought, after drawing a long breath, gave birth ; thou who dwell- 
est in thy father, wholly one with him in essence; thou who art 
his consort and his conscience; Energy of Zeus, spark that 
kindlest and maintainest the fire of heroes and men of genius, 
make thou us rich in spiritual gifts !" Let us not be ashamed of 
such prose dithyrambic expressions. If we understand the 
gods and their meaning, "they will lift us beyond mere existence." 

Every Egyptian maiden told her love to Isis. Every mother 
found sympathy in Isis. Theodore Parker struck the chord 
of human sympathy when he addressed the Deity as "Mother." 
According to Plato she "feeds and receives all things." She was 
called Myrionymus, "having ten thousand names." She said of 
herself, according to Apuleius: "I am Nature, the mother of 
all things, the mistress of the elements, the beginning of the 
ages, the sovereign of the gods, the queen of the dead, the first 
of the heavenly natures, the uniform face of the gods and god- 
desses. It is I who govern the luminous firmament of heaven, the 
salutary breezes of the seas, the horrid silence of Hades, with a 
nod. My divinity, also, which is multiform, is honored with 



i THE GREAT MOTHER 263 

different ceremonies, and under different names — ." On her 
statue stood engraved: "I am all that has been, and is, and 
shall be, and my peplum no mortal has uncovered." Apuleius 
is undoubtedly right when he says: "Isis and Osiris are really 
one and the same divuie power, though their rites and cere- 
monies are very different." Montfaucon truly said: "The 
Egyptians reduced everything to Isis." Isis was the Egyptian 
name for the Great Mother. 

In this conception of Isis there are yet all the characteristics 
of the Eastern mode of thinking, which is not philosophical, but 
religious. It lives and moves in Unity; it draws its existence 
from Nature in a spirit of passive resignation. The human mind 
in ante-Hellenic and ante-Christian times rested in an unreflect- 
ing belief in its own harmony and in its oneness with Nature. 
This is its glory and strength. For that reason it knows intui- 
tively more than the West. But it is also less able to express its 
knowledge. It is not philosophical as I have said. To philos- 
ophize is to reflect, to examine things in relationship and in 
thought. Religion, on the other hand, is active, ethical, and 
meditative, i. e., keeps itself in the Universal. Cybeles' name 
Maia or Ma has been connected with Maya from Mexico. Maya 
is supposed to mean "Mother of the Waters" or "the teats of 
the waters, Ma-y-a, she of the four hundred breasts." Brasseur 
explains this derivation from the fact that the soil of the country 
is honey-combed and just below the surface there exist innumer- 
able and immense caves from which water issues. 

Mother Goddesses 
Mother goddesses, matrons, deae matres were goddesses, of 
which we know comparatively little, among the Celts and Ger- 
mans of the Roman provinces. Scholarship can not yet settle 
whether such Mother goddesses were universal. They probably 
were. Matres or Matronae were cultivated in many places. 
They are known to us only from inscriptions and monuments. 
About 400 inscriptions are known. Roach-Smith holds that 
matronae represent the feminine principle in Nature, with ma- 
ternity and offspring, while matres presided over the fruits of 
the earth and private and public business. It does not seem that 
antiquity knew of two cults, though they may have had common 
18 



264 THE GREAT MOTHER 

origin. Mother goddesses apparently were conceived in triads 
and this has given rise to the idea that they are the parcae. There 
is no ancient literary treatment of the mother-goddesses known. 
But it seems that they were local and friendly divinities, primar- 
ily. And that persons of low rank cultivated them. It does not 
appear that the higher classes did. Fairies may correspond to 
matres. Aditi, Addity, was a goddess of the Rig- Veda. The 
word is composed of a negative and dita, bound, viz. means the 
unbound or infinite being. She is the mother of the Adityas.* 
The word aditi is also used descriptively of many masculine gods 
and in such cases translated eternal, endless, limitless, without 
limit, independent, inexhaustible, fluent, whole, free, and similar 
terms; all for short meaning "without end" and always of 
religious signification and great import. Aditi is the lovely, the 
graceful, the friend of man, always beautifully giving; she is 
also the one who can not be attacked (anarva) and the one who 
can defend ; who has a large place which can hold many ; whose 
power is far reaching and never deceitful. But in all these terms 
she is no more specialized than many other gods. It is especially 
as mother that she is remarkable, and it is strange that a god so 
masculine as Agni (Fire) often carries the feminine name Aditi. 
Aditi may mean "personification of the imperishable daylight," 
also Nature's rejuvenescence, also eternally young, always lib- 
eral, full of life, the source of life, etc. But such terms as these 
must not be supposed to lessen the first and primary idea that she 
is a living person, the Great Mother. Aditi is also the wife of 
Vishnu but in the Ramayana she is the mother of Vishnu by 
Kasyapa, the sun in fertilizing form. Aditi is also called "the 
mother of the world" and of Indra. She was incarnated as 
Devaki mother of Krishna.** 

The Ancient Deities and the Great Mother 

The further we go back in mythology, the more forms we find 
of the Great Mother. The ancients lived in communion with 



* The Rig Veda mentions as many as 8 among them. Varuna, the great master of 
life and death, also Mitra, Savitar and Surya. 

In later times there were 12, viz. the 12 months of the year. 
** In a footnote (page 145 of " Natural Religion ") Max Muller explains that aditi does 
not mean the Infinite as a result of a long process of abstract reasoning, but the visible 
Infinite, visible by the naked eye, the endless expanse beyond the earth, beyond the 
clouds, beyond the sky ; a very realistic presentation of the Great Mother. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 265 

her directly and not indirectly in her works. And they under- 
stood as children understand their mother, and they did not 
care for clear definite shapes. She was too big to be enclosed in 
intellectual caskets. The tribe of poets had not arisen. As illus- 
trations, I now mention a series of ancient Greek female deities 
all of indefinite shape, but most universal in character and ex- 
pressing numerous aspects of the Great Mother. 

Chaos was the Great Mother or the seed of all: the great 
womb out of which came both the passive and active powers, both 
substance and subject. Chaos was self active and emanated all. 
Chaos was intelligence and not, as erroneously thought by some, 
confusion. 

Earth or terra was the Greek Mother's substantial form. Eros 
was her form as subject and her formative method personified. 
Some mythologists thought that Eros existed before all genera- 
tions. That idea seems to suggest that the Great Mother was 
ever and always creating and producing. No wonder that she 
is worshipped everywhere in this aspect. 

Erebus or Night is the Mother's tremendous breath of dark- 
ness sent over her works for her own purposes and as it seems 
to hide some of her ways of doing. By night she covers her 
Order, Figure, Succession and Retention. Theology calls these 
attributes Providence. Mystics call them Contemplation, because 
the Great Mother reveals them in our dreams, and dreams are 
contemplative, viz., ways of beholding. In Night the Great 
Mother also covers what man calls deceit, malice, trouble and 
hunger, war, duplicity, perjury, qualities which he dares not 
openly charge to the Mother. Some day men will return to 
Night as to a greater god than the Day. At that time man shall 
be happier than now. Poets now dream of and imagine the 
gardens of the Hesperides, and place there the happy land of 
the Great Mother, a mythological Paradise. 

Death or Mors is another equally mysterious side of the 
Mother's Ways. By Death she balances all her acts and their 
consequences. It is a grand restoration of equilibrium. The 
seed dies to live. The evil ones fear death and dress in black 
clothes at her approach. Innocence wraps itself in white. When 
the Mother is less radical, she acts as sleep and by dreams. The 



266 THE GREAT MOTHER 

artists know the Great Mother in her capacity as Death under 
the form of a beautiful boy with or without wings. 

Somnus or Morpheus is that form of sleep which quiets the 
passions. The artists expressed it by letting him rest his head 
on a lion and allowing a lizard at his feet and the poets tell us 
that Somnus gives prophetic dreams. 

Nymphs are the expressions of the Great Mother's nursing 
qualities. They are "young maidens" representing the benevolent 
qualities of Nature, such as are found in some hills, forests, 
meadows and springs. They are called Niads in springs, Oreads 
on hills, Dryads or Hamadryads in trees. They all infuse fruit- 
fulness, health or other good qualities to the places they occupy. 
Health and inspiration comes from them and when man has a 
distant realization of peculiar helpfulness, in certain places, he 
may be sure of the Great Mother's presence there. Nymphs may 
be called the spirits of the place they inhabit and man must be 
careful how he deals with them. In the Argonautics of Apol- 
lonius Rhodius, Phineas thus explains to the heroes the cause of 
the poverty of Peraebios : 

But he was paying the penalty laid on 

His father's crime ; for one time cutting trees 

Alone among the hills, he spurned the prayer 

Of the Hamadryas Nymphs, who, weeping sore, 

With earnest words besought him not to cut 

The trunk of an old oak tree, which, with herself 

Coeval, had endured for many a year. 

But, in the pride of youth, he foolishly 

Cut it, and to him and his race the Nymph 

Gave ever after a lot profitless. 

It is not only on account of Nymphs that rivers may give us 
the impression of the Great Mother's presence. Many rivers 
and fountains are directly associated with her. Most rivers are 
feminine. Nymphse means prophesy or a peculiar divine virtue 
pertaining to femininity, and the feminine ready receptivity of 
the divine afflatus. Oracles existed which were called Nymphse. 
The Python-Apollo oracle at Delphi was called Delphus, the 
womb. The Pythoness derived her mystical gift from inhaling 



THE GREAT MOTHER 267 

the exhilarating gas from a fissure in the ground called cunnus 
diaboli. Orpheus' interpretations were derived from the same 
source. Suidas informs us that the mother of Zeus was called 
Nympha by the Athenians, in other words Zeus was not self 
originated, but born. t His mother was a form of the Great 
Mother. It is commonly understood that the vulgar neither 
can or dare go where the Nymphs dwell. Only artists and poets 
and those inspired are admitted. Warbling brooks, the sacred 
gloom of forests and the secrecy of the "firmly-rooted" moun- 
tains destroy the irreverend. 

Styx was a celebrated river of Hades flowing nine times around 
it ; nine is the number of gestation of man. An oath is sworn by 
the solemnity of the course of a soul through the Mother on 
the way to existence on earth. Even the gods swear by Styx. 

Hecate's power extended throughout the universe. She is 
incarnated magic and is called Luna in heaven, Diana or Artemis 
on earth and Proserpine in Hades. Almost any and all powers 
of the Great Mother are personified in Hecate which explains 
why she was invoked at all sacrifices and offerings. In many as- 
pects she is Night, not night as a physical phenomenon, but Mys- 
tery. She is the Occult and the power which the Great Mother 
gives to favorite enchanters and enchantresses. She haunts 
crossways and graves in company with spirits and spectres. 
Offerings are made to her at those places. All kinds of cross- 
ings are "occult," because two or more powers meet there and 
either mingle or struggle everlastingly. Usually death lingers at 
crossings. Railroad accidents ought to assure moderns about 
that. Hekate is not handsome; on the contrary she is fearful, 
being represented by three statues standing back and back, one 
having a dog's head, one that of a horse and the third that of a 
woman, representing respectively beastliness, cleverness and en- 
chantment. The dog is the only animal that will turn and eat 
its own excrements. Hekate eats dead matter as well as living. 

A genuine old trait shows how mankind from early days real- 
ized the Great Mother's Presence in or with their own person. 
The trait is belief in genius. 

Genius was "a great unknown"; a godly personification of a 
man himself. Women had their Junos in the same way. Man 



268 THE GREAT MOTHER 

recognizing his genius, shows his realization of his bisexual 
character and his willingness to recognize his inner and unseen 
character as the highest in him and which he was willing or even 
anxious to obey. The word genius probably means generator; 
if so, the respect for genius is explained. A genius may be male 
or female, but is usually thought of as of no sex or rather bi- 
sexual and therefore naturally a clear type of the Great Mother. 
A genius is by Plato for instance called a Daemon. As house 
protectors they were called penates and were originally gods; 
they were also called lares and were originally human beings. 

Horace is the name of the Great Mother considered as the 
mover of all things ; the time dancing away with man, but guid- 
ing and guarding him if he will. They represent equity. 

The Graces or Charites are the charms which surround Aph- 
rodite when the Great Mother smiles fragrance and incense. 

The Muses are very ancient deities of music, song and dance 
and special forms of the Great Mother when she enters the 
halls of man and wants to bestow poetic wisdom on him and 
teach him to write his own history, a history not paralleled by 
any of her actions in the Open or the Universal. The Muses 
loved Mt. Helicon, the opposite of Cithaeron, inhabited by the 
Furies. 

Both Greek and Hebrew Mythology give us an insight into 
many mysteries relating to the Great Mother. Here is one as- 
pect. 

Mt. Helicon is in Boetia and was the haunt of the Muses; 
here flowed the sacred spring of Aganippe around which the 
Muses danced and the clear source of Hippocrene in which they 
bathed. The whole mountain was celebrated for its fresh rills, 
cool groves and flowery slopes. 

Mt. Citharon is also in Boetia bujt on the opposite side and 
separating it from Attica. Here the Erinnyes yelled and the 
wildest Bacchanalian orgies took place. It was a savage, cold, 
gloomy and inhospitable mountain. Here an infuriate troop of 
women tore Pentheus, the Theban king, to pieces. Here Act- 
aeon was devoured by his own dogs set upon him by Diana be- 
cause he had seen her in the bath. Here the luckless Oedipus 
had been exposed by the order of his father. Here the terrible 
Sphragitian Nymphs inspired a visitor with frenzy, etc. 



the; great mother 269 

The two mountains encircling Boetia symbolized to the Greeks 
respectively the pastoral life and tragedy ; on one side culture and 
refinement ; on the other the savage passions, etc., the double na- 
ture of our emotions. 

In Palestine there are two similar mountains : Gerizim and 
Ebal. Also here has the mythological mind found expressions 
in a sort of kindergarten language for its intuitions about the 
Presence of the Mother. And the character of the expression is 
strictly Hebrew. 

Mt. Gerizim lies in Ephraim and from it were pronounced the 
blessings. The record is this. Six tribes were placed on Geri- 
zim and six on Ebal, opposite. And the ark probably in the valley 
between them and Joshua read the blessings and cursings suc- 
cessively. The Levites on either side re-echoed them and the 
people responded "Amen!" This is recorded in Deut. xi: 1-15 
and Joshua viii : 33-35. 

Mt. Gerizim was full of cities and natural beauty and rich in 
Nature bounties. Mt. Ebal was bare and rocky. They almost 
meet at their bases, but are about a mile apart at their summits. 
Ebal is to the north; Gerizim to the south. The human voice 
can be heard distinctly from the top of one mountain to the other 
and in the valley between. The site of Joshua's altar is supposed 
to have been where now is "the monument of faith" on top of 
Ebal and the Kabbalistic mysteries of the whole subject confirm 
the supposition. 

Not only do these two mountains respectively of Greece and 
Palestine illustrate the double nature of our emotional life such 
as Kabbalism understands the Eternal Mother, but they are also 
cosmological signs for certain physiological conditions, such 
as antiquity loved to find them in Nature. To the Mystic these 
opposite mountains speak what Walt Whitman calls "the right 
voice."* 

To revert to the Graces. 

The Great Mother's manifoldness is also illustrated by the 
Graces. The Graces are the central power of gracefulness in 
Nature and the human form. The Graces are art forms and 
synonyms of slenderness, that kind of slenderness which means 

* See my " The Inner-I«ife and the Tao-Teh-King," second chapter. 



270 THE GREAT MOTHER 

strength so completely under control that it makes perfection. 
The best Greek statuary shows it by giving the figure an impul- 
sive movement, yet leaving it at the same time at perfect rest. 
Praxitele's Hermes has that kind of gracefulness in masculine 
form. Gracefulness such as the Mother shows it so often, if 
we are attentive, can be seen in the drapery of the figures on the 
pediment of the Parthenon. A loose drapery can hardly ever fall 
otherwise than gracefully after the forms and the shape of the 
body. Even if this is not perfect, the Great Mother always tries 
to call attention by means of it to her language of beauty. To 
be graceful when nude is a most exalted virtue, but rare. The 
Graces are rarely nude. Said Pausanias: "I do not know who 
was the first person to represent the Graces nude either in sculp- 
ture or painting, for in olden times both painters and sculptors 
represented them draped." And why draped? For the reason 
of correspondence. As already said, it is an extremely rare gift 
to be graceful without garment. Gracefulness lies in the folds 
of the garment and the motion behind it, but separate they rep- 
resent something else. 

r' "These three (the Graces) on men all gracious gifts bestow," 
and they are named Aglaia or Splendor ; she infuses art. Thalia 
or Bloom throbs in true religion. Euphrosyne or Joy is the 
mystery of our union with God. 
Hebe was youth incarnated. She is the Great Mother freeing 
a man from the chains and bonds of irrationality, conventionality 
and illusions. She pours out the Elixir of Life and is naturally 
associated with Minerva. Roman youths offered prayer to her 
when they put on the toga virilis. 

Flora and Pomona are the Great Mother's forms when she 
manifests herself in flowers and fruits. They are luck; and so 
are Victoria, Fortuna, Fortitudo, Veritas, Pax, Fidelitas and 
Amicitia. All these forms are personifications of the Great 
Mother's work in civil life. They are as old as civil life and 
their existence proves how universal was the worship of the 
Great Mother in ancient days. To mention them now is to 
prove them as unknown gods, for I fear that few of my read- 
ers know of them and I am sure still fewer, if any, worship them. 

The Sybils were the views of the Great Mother as prophetess. 



the; great mother 271 

The word is Doric and means "the will of the god." They are 
mentioned as dwelling at Troy, in Ionia, on Samos, at Delphi 
and at Cumse. The most famous was the Erythraean, often iden- 
tified with the Cumaean. The Erinnyes or Fatal Sisters are 
goddesses of light and,, types of the Great Mother in her fatal 
determinations. The Great Mother will not stand any trans- 
gressions of her natural order. Without mercy as Allecto "she 
who rests not," as Tisiphone, the "avenger of murder" and 
as Megaera, "the jealous one" she avenges herself. She wants 
"an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." But her three forms are 
"honorable" and "kind"; they are not arbitrary. The Roman 
Furies are mere adaptations of the Greek Erinnyes, and Aeschy- 
lus' Gorgons are poetic fancies. 

The Erinnyes are the mystic types of life's laws of necessity 
or the Great Mother's inflexible will, a will which must be obeyed 
because it expresses the good and the best for all concerned. 
The heroes and the gods are especially subject to the Erinnyes, 
because they are the Great Mother's special messengers and 
workmen in the world among men. It is only in struggle that 
they are perfected and their pain is a result of acts they com- 
mit and must commit. Phoebos must kill Kyklopes and himself 
atone for the murder. Alkestis must die, if her husband is to 
live. Heracles must become a slave to one weaker than himself. 
Perseus must unwittingly do harm to others and be punished by 
insanity, etc. All these acts are acts of the Great Mother, done 
at her command — and punished by her. Injustice? No, Man 
cannot understand her ways. Those who are wise among the 
ancients called the Erinnyes Eumenides or "the merciful ones" 
because they realized there is mercy and goodness in all the 
Great Mother does. A series of Goddesses of similar charac- 
ter connect with the Erinnyes. They are the Moirai, the Fates, 
the Norns, Nemesis, Adrasteia, Tyke, etc. They are nature- 
forms of the Great Mother's when she works among men or in 
human society, but that aspect of her revelations lies beyond 
the scope of this book. If the reader will take the trouble to 
compare the number and significance of all the female goddesses 
to the male gods in Greek mythology, there can be no doubt left 
in the mind about the universal recognition of the Great Mother, 
and it may even be said that she is the main subject of mythology. 



272 the; great mother 

Everything fundamental is feminine; the manifestations are 
sometimes masculine but not ordinarily. 

The Great Mother and " Naturam Expellas Furca, Tamen 
Usque Recurret" 

Another way of talking about Proteus is the proverbial 

Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret 
Bt mala perrumpet furtim fastidia victrix. 

"You may suppress natural propensities by force, but they will 
be certain to reappear and in silent triumph break through thy 
affected disdain." (Horace's Epistles I: 10, 24.) "Custom could 
never get the better of Nature, for she always comes off vic- 
torious." (Cicero.) "Nature is obstinate; she can not be over- 
come; she demands what is her own." (Seneca.) Popular 
proverbs express the same thought: — "What is bred in the bone 
will never out of the flesh." "Plant a crabtree where you will, 
it will never bear pippins." "A wolf changes his hair, but not 
his nature." "The fox may grow grey, but never good." 

"And this is rightly said by Diogenes, that, if all things were 
not out of ONE thing, it would not be possible for them to act, or 
to be acted upon by one another : for example, that which is hot 
should become cold ; or, reciprocally, that this should become hot 
— for it is not the heat nor the coldness that changes one ' into 
another, but that evidently changes which is the SUBJECT of 
these affections: whence it follows that in those things, where 
there is acting and being acted upon, it is necessary there should 
belong to them some ONE Nature, their COMMON SUB- 
JECT."* 

Proteus and the Great Goddesses 

Proteus was a sea deity who could assume any form at pleas- 
ure, changing into fire or water, plant or animal and thus diffi- 
cult to catch ; always evasive. He could however, be caught and 
when held fast by strong arms was compelled to appear in his 
real character and had to give answer in the spirit of divination. 
This mythological tale is rendered by Heraclitus under the phil- 

* Aristotle : De Genes, et Cor., I., 6, 20. Ed. Sylb. The Diogenes here quoted was a 
contemporary of Anaxagoras, and lived many years before the great cynic of that name. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 273 

osophy of Flux. The Great Mother has always been presented 
in numerous forms. She is a veritable Proteus. And yet she 
has also types among the Great Goddesses, those of Olympus. 
All Nature is motion, changeableness ; even a superficial ob- 
server can see it. But fye does not see the life that is changeless : 
the life, which is the Great Mother behind the veil. Proteus is 
actually no form, but the capacity of all forms ; the motion which 
rushes into forms and shapes. Lord Verulam tells us that Pro- 
teus signifies Matter, mater, "the ancient of all things." In the 
Odyssey Proteus is "the deathless ancient of the deep" and Virgil 
in Georgics says 

the slippery god .... 

. . . . various forms assumes, to cheat thy sight. 

Love, passion, desire and fire are but Proteus transformations 
and forms and can not be separated. Fire is the Mother-Father ; 
Light is the Sister-Brother; Heat is the Spirit-Mother; three in 
one: the Great Breath. The Great Mother's Proteus character 
recalls Rousseau. His description of a landscape is almost a 
picture of her. In his twenty-third letter to Julia, Rousseau ex- 
pressed how charmed he was by "a surprising mixture of wild 
and cultivated Nature." "Here Nature seems to have a singular 
pleasure in acting contradictory to herself, so different does she 
appear in the same place in different aspects. Towards the east, 
the flowers of spring; to the south, the flowers of autumn; and 
northwards, the ice of winter. Add to that the illusions of vision, 
the tops of the mountains variously illuminated, the harmonious 
mixture of light and shade." 

Among the Olympian goddesses there is a fourfoldness of 
forms of the Great Mother, just as we should expect. There 
are Light, Fire, Water and Earth goddesses. The Roman satirist 
Petronius said, "it is easier to find a god in Athens than a man," 
and as far as the number of the gods is concerned he spoke the 
truth. I will therefore not attempt a full exposition of what 
Paul called the Athenian "carefulness in religion," but only speak 
about the most important gods and goddesses as they relate to 
the Great Mother. And again it shall be seen how the funda- 
mental forces of life are feminine and not masculine. 



274 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Athene 

Athene is probably the Vedic Ahana, the morning, or the Greek 
Daphne (Vedic Dahana). She is a child of the Waters, viz. she 
springs from the forehead of the sky and remains fresh and 
undefiled for ever. She is a virgin. The Athenian Akropolis 
recognized her as purely physical, but being Dawn, the awakener, 
she becomes light and knowledge. According to an earlier 
tradition, she had no mother; was self -originated. But she is 
also called Tritogeneia, child of Tritos or all the streams. The 
story of her birth from the head of Zeus by a cut from Hep- 
haistos' brazen axe is explained by Pindar as illustrating the sud- 
den stream of light shooting up in the morning sky, which it 
seems to cleave. She is often called Pallas, Pallas-Athene, which 
means the dawn springing from night and the night seeking to 
mar or destroy her, symbolized by the giant Pallas attempting to 
violate her purity and therefore slain by her. Pallas is a form 
for Phallos. She has an endless series of names, all describing 
her in terms of mind, but her physical character is never kept 
out of sight. In one of the Orphic hymns she is said to be both 
male and female. She is the Latin Minerva. Minerva is the 
Greek fih/os the Sanscrit manas, or Mind, but as such she leaves 
the distinct Nature form of the Great Mother. Gathering up the 
various threads, it is clear that Athena is the Great Mother as the 
transparent Ether, whose purity is always breaking forth in 
unveiled brilliancy through clouds and obscurity. More specially 
as a deity, she is the thunder and lightning which destroys all 
falsity and lies. Hence she is often called a goddess of war. It 
is from the Ether or the Upper Air that bright air and dew 
comes. It is the morning that brings peace, hence she is called 
the giver of the Olive-tree and as peace gives wisdom, the 
peplos or mantle was presented at her chief festival, the harvest 
festival. Mother Nature is thus peace, wisdom and maturity 
and for that reason also the mother of numerous discoveries and 
the protectress of arts and handiworks. It is readily seen how 
manifold Athene is and that she is both masculine and feminine 
or in other words a rich form of the Great Mother. Phidias 
discovered her art form. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 275 

Aphrodite 

Aphrodite is another dawn goddess or goddess of light. She is 
originally not the same as Venus, as will appear. She is originally 
the Great Mother as day or life coming out of the sea. She is 
therefore called the foamborn, Aphro-genesia or Anadyomena 
"she who rises" viz. out of the sea. She is at the same time god- 
dess of the air, earth and water. As goddess of the sea she is wor- 
shipped by sailors. As goddess of the earth she is adored and 
worshipped in gardens and groves. In both cases her worship 
becomes very sensual in later times, because her worshippers 
had degenerated. But as "the heavenly" Aphrodite Urania, she 
also remained and remained triumphantly, because her inherent 
nature is heavenly. Athene was the severity of the morning; 
Aphrodite is its charm, its loveliness and splendor, and as the dawn 
is unsullied by any breath of passion, so she is "heavenly" and 
full of arrows ; the giant Polyphemos found that out. Athene's 
ministers were the Vestals. Aphrodite's attendants were the 
Hierodouloi of the later days, and, a disgrace they were. Orig- 
inally she had no girdle nor needed it. The girdle was witchery 
and external and persuasion. In art Aphrodite has been rep- 
resented under a higher and lower aspect, as love and as lust. 
Aphrodite as the Great Mother is patient with her children. To 
some she is a goddess, to others a cow. To all she is aspiration 
and yearning. The cow does not understand herself. Venus 
was a Roman goddess of springtime or rejuvenescence. More 
specially she was called Venus Genetrix as mother of the Roman 
people. It is not clear how she came to be identified with 
Aphrodite. But as a goddess of spring she is, of course, easily 
recognized as a form of the Great Mother. Her name is indica- 
tive of Spring. It connects with the Sanscrit root van, to desire, 
to love, to favor. The word is found in the German wonne and 
the English winsome. Aphrodite is the Great Mother or that 
charm which finishes everything; which perfects creation; she is 
that delicacy which refines all manners and makes culture and 
civilization in their best aspects. She burnishes the feathers and 
furs. She spiritualizes everything. 

Here 

Here is rather a semblance than a reality of any independent 



276 THE GREAT MOTHER 

power. She is the Sanskrit "gleaming heaven" or the Upper Air 
and thus a type of serenity and majesty. The artists represent 
her as a majestic woman, as the "large-eyed" and the "white- 
armed," and these characteristics are clearly personified passions 
springing from jealousy and fury. But originally she is the 
upper ether or atmosphere of permanency, quiet and regularity, 
quite removed from strife. In that we see the Great Mother 
as spiritual substance, as lustre or appearance of inner value, as 
master-light, as exaltation, as queen of ascendency and pro- 
tector. 

Juno is the Roman conception of Here. She is the feminine 
conception of the Heavenly Light, especially the light of the 
moon and thereby she becomes sacred to woman. As every man 
had a genius, so every woman had her Juno to whom she sacri- 
ficed and by whom she swore. As all goddesses of light are 
goddesses of birth, so also Juno. She was the special Roman 
Lucina or goddess of birth and marriage. Juno-Here lost the 
golden apple in the contest with Athene and Aphrodite. The up- 
per air can not be called lovely or charming like the fair dawn 
of mist, Aphrodite. Athene lost because she was solemn. 

Artemis 

Artemis was a virgin and twin-sister of Apollo. She was 
goddess of chastity, the chase and the woods. She was also a 
celestial deity and called Luna, the Moon. As goddess of the 
infernal regions she was Hekate or Persephone and kept the 
multitude of ghosts in order. What a multitude of views of the 
Great Mother ! Evidently Artemis must be an ancient deity and 
most important. She roams over hills and dales, both night and 
day; deals with man as well as with gods and the infernals; 
with all, except the Waters. She is a counterpart of her 
brother, Apollo. What more could she be in one person? Like 
Apollo, her brother and counterpart, she is Light, both as purity 
and as shaping or moulding power. That is her central char- 
acter as ruler of the day and of the infernal regions. As type 
of the Great Mother's work, she is the plastic force of life; the 
hand that moulds and makes for right. Artemis is also identified 
very often with Isis, Ceres and Rhea, Kubele and Aphrodite 
Urania and therefore called the Mother of the World and rep- 



the great mother 277 

resented with emblems signifying heaven, earth and the Under- 
earth. When she is tired of the chase, she unbends her bow and 
hastens to Delphi to her brother and leads the choruses of the 
Muses and Graces in singing the praises of Leto. As Diana she 
was known at Ephesus^on account of her many breasted statue 
which was supposed to have fallen from heaven. The lower 
part was formed into a Hermean statue in the usual square form, 
a symbol of the female productive powers among the ancients. 
(About the Square I have written elsewhere.) Artemis Diana 
is thus multiform, but not so diverse that she would be a hetero- 
geneity. On the contrary she is the Great Mother in a most 
harmonious appearance in Nature: the Moon, Selene. The 
Moon is a mediatrix. In chaste sobriety she has the power to 
balance opposites and stays all passions and meanness. The cool 
light of the moon chastens wildness. 

Hestia- Vesta 

Prominent among the Fire forms of the Great Mother is 
Hestia- Vesta. She is the fire on the earth, symbol and pledge 
of kindliness and good faith, of law and order, wealth and fair 
dealing. She is a pure maiden like the fire on the hearth in the 
inmost part of the house. She represents the Great Mother as 
Truth innermost in the heart. She is thus a tutelary deity and 
does not belong to the Open. (Of Fire I have written elsewhere.) 

Water Goddesses 

Among Water-gods, the Naiads and Nereids are prominent; 
they are nymphs and have been explained in their proper place 
among "ancient deities." The Sirens lure the mariners to their 
ruin by singing. It is not they who sing; it is the sailor who 
sings in the calm and forgets the sandbars, who is lured to ruin 
or who sends himself there. The Sirens, however, are also sym- 
bols of the magic of beauty, eloquence and song, viz., they repre- 
sent the Great Mother's charming attractiveness on the seashore, 
for instance on a warm afternoon or evening when the sun's 
rays fall slanting over the waves, illuminating their crests and 
turning their music into higher keys of superlative character 
and causing the human ear to forget dangers. 

Scylla and Charybdis were two "terrible" monsters of whirl- 



278 THE GREAT MOTHER 

pools against which even the help of Poseidon was unavail- 
ing. They are the opposites or forms of the Great Mother 
which all must avoid. The Mother demands a straight course 
but gives the sailor his freedom. Life is Necessity, but we have 
our freedom, which, if used correctly, brings us into safe haven. 
Without Scylla and Charybdis, the Great Mother could not edu- 
cate us. The Great Mother is, in Slav legend, called the Sea 
into whose arms the sun sinks wearily at the close of the day. 
She is also called sea-serpent, Labismina. The Great Mother 
is commonly conceived as a sea in ancient cosmogonies either 
because the ancients saw physical life arise from water or be- 
cause of the general analogy between water and wisdom. In 
Babylonian cosmogony, she was the Unfathomable Wisdom and 
also called "the lady of the abyss," "the voice of the abyss." 
Labismina comes again in the corruption I'abysme; which Mur- 
ray's Dictionary translates "a subterraneous reservoir of waters." 
In Chaldea Mummu Tia wath, the sea, brought forth every- 
thing and Mama meant "the lady of the gods." This same word 
mama was also used by the Peruvians and Slavs for mother. 

Demeter-Persephone. 

Among Earth forms of the Great Mother, Demeter occupies 
a most prominent place. Demeter-Ceres, mother of Persephone 
is not the same as Earth or Gaia. She is the life on the earth, 
manifested as growing corn and in agriculture in general. Dem- 
eter's life and character is clearly connected with that of her 
daughter, Persephone or Proserpine as she was called by the 
Latins. Persephone played with the ocean nymphs on the Nys- 
ian plain and plucked flowers. Suddenly she saw the beautiful 
Narcissus, an amazement to "all immortal gods and mortal 
men" and unconscious of danger she was as suddenly caught by 
Aidoneus (Aides, Hades) or Pluto and carried off to his realm, 
Hades. Her mother in great grief sought the lost daughter. 
Nine days she wandered over the earth with flaming torches 
seeking her and tasting neither nectar nor food. At last she 
learned from the god of the Sun who had carried Persephone off. 
Sorrows, trials and adventures now come to Demeter. At 
last Hermes is sent to Hades and brings back the message that 
Persephone could come back provided she has not eaten anything 



TH£ GREAT MOTHER 279 

in Hades. She had, however, eaten a pomegranate. As a re- 
sult of that she must spend one third of the year with the hus- 
band ; the other two she could pass with Demeter and the gods. 
The myth explains the Great Mother's method with the grain. 
It lies hid for a time 19 the soil and sprouts, and, lives the rest 
of its existence over the ground. 

The Persephone myth illustrates the connection between the 
Underworld or the Other- World and this present world of day- 
light. Life swings between Light and Darkness. The swing 
is the Great Mother's Presence. It is and it is not. But it is 
the Reality which appears in the momentum. (Of the Moment, 
I have written elsewhere.) 

Gaia-Rhea. 

The Great Mother Earth is seen preeminently in her Priests: 
Gaia and Rhea. Hesiod mentions the Great Earth as Gaia, the 
self -existent, without parents. With the sky, another aspect 
of herself, she bears a host of children. He calls her also Rhea, 
who by Time is the mother of Hestia, Demeter, Here and some 
males. Rhea produces life through death. She is thus pre- 
eminently called the Great Mother, Ma and Kybele. With 
Rhea are connected the mystic Kouretes, Daktyls, Kabeiroi and 
Korybantes, magical nature powers of great variety. Rhea 
is usually called Mother of the Gods and is Fruitfulness. In 
Rome she was Magna Mater and introduced by order of the 
Sibylline oracle and became very popular. Her trees are the oak 
and the pine; her animal is the lion. 

According to the plan of this book, I now have mentioned 
only classical goddesses and enough of them to show how pow- 
erfully the Great Mother dominates mythology. Other mythol- 
ogies will show the same. 

Semitic-Hebrew Views of Nature 

A transition from the Greek atmosphere to the Semitic na- 
ture views is marked with strong contrast and mainly because 
Masculinity is too prominent a feature. 

To look for Semitic views of Nature, we do not go to Gene- 
sis, for instance, but to the Psalms, the Prophets and the Book 
of Job. These writings reflect the Hebrew poetry of Nature and 
19 



280 THE GREAT MOTHER 

their central thought is the immediate Presence of the Great 
Mother. They do not give lessons in Nature details; they de- 
scribe Wholeness, Vastness, Movements, and the descriptions 
convey the idea of Femininity. The terms do not stand for mere 
descriptions, they are delineations of character. The book of 
Job enters somewhat into individual details in order to point 
out the visible witnesses to the Invisible One. 

The Hebrew books make some sharp distinctions between 
creator and creation but we need not take that philosophy 
for more than poor style, defective method of expression and 
as a result of the Mosaic forceful teaching of the Unity of the 
Deity. The books could not avoid expressing the Nature they 
sprang from, no matter how severe the external discipline was. 
Everywhere one feels the restraint and also the submerged free- 
dom. The Hebrew mind had developed in the Open and not in 
the city; it had lived to full maturity under the constant drill 
of the Unseen Presence and directed by the Great Forces around 
about it, it could not deny its nature. And from Egypt the He- 
brews carried fruitful ideas on Nature- Worship. The result of 
so powerful influences could only be as they were. The He- 
brews wandered with a veil before them; they, so to say, only 
felt the garment of their Leader, but they had no doubt about 
a Living Presence everywhere and at all times. They could 
never be sure whether or not the Eternal One might or might 
not break through any minute. 

The Old Testament 

The Old Testament contains a progressive revelation of the 
great name, such as the Hebrews learned it. The oldest general 
names are such as these: El, Eloah, Elohim and El' Elyon; 
they express multiplicity or the Deity in manifoldness without 
any individualistic characteristics. Whether the special use of 
these terms was polytheistic or immanential, no matter, they 
were terms for the Most High expressing fulness, plenitude and 
awe, just such ideas as are connected with Mother Nature when 
men submit and adore. And a most interesting fact is this, that 
the name is united to a singular verb, clearly indicating that it 
stands for one personal being. El as a name for the Deity 
means "the strong one" and El' Elyon is the "Most High God," 



TH3 GREAT MOTHER 28 1 

no doubt, the Highest Nature, judging from the Hebrew awe 
for that Omnipresence which the nation only later learned to 
call El Shaddai and Jahveh, two words meaning "God Almighty" 
as the "living one," "the creator." In all these terms lies a per- 
sonal character. The Hebrew sought God, not abstract truth. 
He was led as by a Mother, even if this Mother was at times 
very masculine. 

The Old Testament view is that Nature is the self-revelation 
of the Deity in glory and joy (Ps. civ. 31) Even Jahveh swore 
"As truly as I live, the whole earth shall be filled with glory of 
Jahveh" (Num. xiv. 21). The prevailing idea in the Hebrew 
conception of the Deity is an almighty will ordering all things 
in conformity with an eternal purpose. But that does not imply 
a previous chaos or a ruling principle against hostile and obscure 
forces. Even in the poetical allusions to such powers in Job 
ix, 13 and xxvi, 12, it appears that these are incapable of re- 
sisting the Deity. Nature is from the morning of creation still 
and forever a continuous song of glory in which the earth unites 
with the heavenly host (Ps. cxlviii). Nature's order is also the 
moral order of the world. Everywhere we find traces of divine 
wisdom and its relation to human affairs. The Old Testament 
holds four terms of characteristic value for the understanding 
of Nature as the manifestation of the Deity or the Great Mother. 
They are the Glory, the Name, the Face and the malakh of God. 
The first term means the consuming fire so often spoken of; 
that dazzling light no one dared to look upon. From Ezekiel 
on, that Glory is connected with the sanctuary. For us, of to- 
day, there is no difficulty in reading the Mother's messages in 
Light. The Name of the Deity is no mere title. The Name of 
the Deity is everywhere where the Presence is felt and experi- 
enced. The Name means Presence and Presence is an experi- 
ence, no intellectual signification. The Face of the Deity is an 
expression also for Presence. Peni-el or "face of God" was 
Jacob's exclamation: "I have seen God face to face." It was 
God's "face that attended Israel across the desert" (Ex. xxxiii, 
14-16) viz., the guiding Mother, the Shekinah. Malakh is a 
difficult term, but probably means the Angel of the Lord or 
God's Presence. The term is mentioned as early as the song 
of Deborah. It may also properly be translated Logos. These 



282 THE GREAT MOTHER 

four terms for the Deity when revealed as God are most sig- 
nificant. They all, taken together, mean the Presence of the 
Great Mother; singly, they stand for four prominent attributes: 
Light or Prophesy, Foundation or the Apostolic Ground ; Spirit- 
uality or the Pastoral Guidance; Speech or Evangelistic Proc- 
lamation. (Comp. Eph. 4). Indeed we 

"May find a tongue in every flame, 
And hear a voice in every wave;" 

and easily perceive the Presence in the sable woods and Her 
revered form on mountains, all illumined by the bright and ra- 
diant sky. 

The Book of Job illustrates the Mother. It is not Hebrew, it 
is Semitic in a general way. 

The Book of Job 

To get the full and right understanding of this book the atten- 
tion must be riveted upon the prologue and the epilogue. From 
the prologue it is evident that Job was a righteous man and 
that his afflictions and pain were not results of sin and iniquity, 
but that Satan was permitted to try him. From the epilogue it 
appears that Job was a faithful servant and that the Lord had 
a peculiar pleasure in him. Eliphaz and his two friends were 
admonished and ordered to make an atoning sacrifice, because 
they had not spoken rightly and as reverently as Job. 

Which are the essential truths taught? They are as follows: 
The Great Mother through her Lord Workmaster, Jahveh, visits 
even the pious with manifold afflictions to develop piety, faith 
and virtue. This is expressly taught in the prologue. The 
book also teaches that it is foolish presumption to be angry with 
the Workmaster or the Mother. No man is able to fathom the 
wisdom of his guide. Finally the book shows how blessings and 
glory come to the persevering ones. The book is full of passion 
seeds and flaming swords which burn all ways. The Great 
Mother's wider wisdom enkindles the reader's mind and heart. 
The book is not a catechism, but a torch which illumines her 
beauty. All ages have turned to it and will continue to do so. 
The Mother's power to kill the dragons of unbelief is in it ; also 



THE GREAT MOTHER 283 

a realization of her Presence. It teaches how love may ques- 
tion, yet waits; love is a pilgrim staff and lustral flame. The 
book is full of the unearthly light of the higher forms of Nature- 
Mysticism. 

It is most remarkable and characteristic for my understanding 
of the book that "God" is usually called Jahveh in the prologue 
and epilogue, but not so in the discourses. I see in this fact 
that the general plan of life is (as in the prologue) referred 
to the Workmaster, and that "God" spoken of in the main dis- 
courses, is the Mother herself. A detailed examination will 
bear out this point. 

The Book of Job is a marvelous book indeed ; it vibrates with 
Prometheic fire and Titanic talk. There are traces in it of 
Sabeism. The Zodiac plays a part; the constellations appear as 
giants and monsters in insurrection against the ruling Deity. 
The serpent, the dragon Rahab, Ash, the Great Bear, Orion, the 
Pleiades and Arcturus, all form parts of the drama. The Dawn 
and the Dawn stars seem invested with a peculiar sanctity. 

The Greek Titanic hero, Prometheus, complains that Zeus' 
rule is not just. The Hebrew Titanic hero, Job, on the con- 
trary is convinced that Jahveh's rule is just. Both deal directly 
with the Supreme in invectives and with a freedom that is 
amazing and most instructive to us. And the Drama brings 
Jahveh upon the scene in a whirlwind that He may speak in 
self-defence. He thunders in sarcasms and awe-inspiring de- 
scriptions of His Nature. All these traits and others like them 
make this book a grand Hebrew Nature poem, full of instructions 
on Nature's moral dealings with Man and on the now lost sym- 
bolic relationship between individual man and his heavenly Guru : 
Jahveh. 

Let me draw out some of the main points of the action and the 
speeches which describe Nature. Job was not a Jew. He lived 
in the land of Uz. *"The geography of the land is a commen- 
tary on its poetry. Conceive a land lorded over by the sun, when 
lightning, rushing in, like an angry painter, dashed his wild colors 
across the Landscape ; a land ever in extremes — now dried up as 
in a furnace, now swimming with loud Waters — its sky the 



: George Gilfillan : The Bards of the Bible. Harper and Brothers, N. Y., 1874. 



284 THE GREAT MOTHER 

brightest or the blackest of heavens — desolate crags rising above 
rank vegetation — Beauty adorning the brow of barrenness — 
shaggy and thunder-split hills surrounding narrow valleys and 
water-courses ; a land for a great part bare in the wrath of Na- 
ture, when not swaddled in a sudden tempest and whirlwind; 
a land of lions, and wild goats, and wild asses, and ostriches, 
and hawks stretching toward the south, and horses clothed with 
thunder, and eagles making their nests on high; a land through 
whose transparent Air night looked down in all her queenlike 
majesty, all her most lustrous ornaments on — the south blazing 
through all its chambers with solid gold — the north glorious with 
Arcturus and his sons — the zenith crowning the heavens with a 
diadem of white, and blue, and purple stars. Such the land in 
which this author lived, such the sky he saw ; and can we wonder 
that poetry dropped on and from him, like rain from a thick 
tree; and that grandeur — a grandeur almost disdaining Beauty, 
preferring firmaments to flowers, making its garlands of the 
whirlwinds — became his very soul. The book of Job shows a 
mind smit with a passion for Nature, in her simplest, most soli- 
tary, and elementary forms — gazing perpetually at the great 
shapes of the material universe, and reproducing to us the in- 
fant infinite wonder with which the first inhabitants of the world 
must have seen their first sunrise, their first thunderstorm, their 
first moon waning, their first midnight heaven expanding, like an 
arch of triumph, over their happy heads. One object of the book 
is to prophesy of Nature — to declare its testimony to the Most 
High — to unite the Leaves of its trees, the wings of its fowls, the 
eyes of its stars, in one act of adoration. August undertaking, 
and meet for one reared in the desert, anointed with the dew of 
heaven, and by God himself inspired." 

Such was the setting of the drama played and described in the 
book called "the Book of Job." The setting is full of the pain 
of birth, the Great Mother's stern ways of love and rue. Every- 
where the book is painted in colors like those of the pictures I 
have presented in the earlier parts of my book. The veil of 
life is embroidered with vernal bloom, but also with starvation. 
We breathe the raptures of Oriental nights and awaken to dis- 
cover we are only impassioned dust. Everywhere the Great 
Mother in her ever varying character ! 



THE GREAT MOTHER 285 

The moment Job begins to talk, he emphasizes Night as the 
condition when the Mother is absent: "thick darkness"; "the 
stars of the twilight are dark" ; we "look for light, but have none." 
"Let the night behold the eyelids of the morning !" Job means to 
remove all the possibibity of organic existence and thereby he 
hits the point he wants to make: there is and can be no more 
desolate and miserable existence than that in which the Mother 
is absent. 

To Job as to most Hebrew thinkers happiness means life and 
comfort. The wild ass does not neigh over his pasture, nor does 
the ox low over his fodder. Job is a burden to himself because 
he is deserted. He is alone in a terrible solitude, in which his 
spirit is heaviness, his soul a bitterness and Jahveh's greatness is 
oppressive. Such solitude results from the Mother's absence. 
No wonder that Job exclaims to Jahveh: "Why took'st thou 
me out of my mother's womb ?" 

The book divides itself into three parts and this division and 
the sequence is to simple that it is easily overlooked, but it ought 
not to be neglected. The division is natural and according to the 
Great Mother's method of educating us, when she does it by 
natural means. In the first part Job is afflicted. That is the be- 
ginning of the training. In the second part, the three friends 
come in their worldly conceit and pass an uncalled for judgment; 
nevertheless their mission is in the order of things. In spite of 
themselves they do a good work. In the third part Job has come 
face to face with the problem of his life; he gets larger views 
and discovers how all things in Nature obey the law of their 
lives, except man. His contemplation of Nature saves him. 

Eliphaz is one of Job's friends talking with dignity and very 
ably. His theme is the unapproachable majesty and purity of 
God or the Manifestation of the Great Mother. He is not very 
lucid in his descriptions and that is to be excused. It is not easy 
to draw anything from the silent sea of shadows, but this much 
must be understood, that he does not see or perceive a ghost. 
He was no doubt in the Presence and it was under the influence 
of the Presence that he spoke to Job. 

It is to be noted how strong are the personal expressions used. 
Eliphaz is not talking about laws and causes or natural effects. 



286 THE GREAT MOTHER 

His philosophy seeks something Personal and not Thought; he 
moves in concrete conceptions and not in abstractions. His 
arguments are drawn from experience, not from metaphysics. 
The atmosphere is one of the Inner-Life or Mysticism. 

The whole tone of the book of Job is personal in this way and 
thus it is a chapter in the Mother's Gospel. Eliphaz's advice is 
no clerical advice. Though he is ignorant of the cause of Job's 
trouble and believes that he suffers for sins committed, his advice 
is nevertheless a statement in words of Universal Order to which 
we must commit our cause. If we do that, we shall not meet 
with darkness in daytime. If we "seek unto God" we shall not 
be afraid of the beasts of the earth, because Universal Order is 
then established. Moreover, among "the marvelous things with- 
out number," will be this that we shall be "in league with the 
stones of the field" or, in other words, we shall be in full posses- 
sion of our occult powers : "We have searched it, and so it is." 
Poor Job replied and tells how the "arrows of the Almighty" 
and the "terrors of God" are against him ; likens "his brethren" 
to the deceit of a brook : now so charming and attractive and then 
again "passed away when it wax warm." — 

Bildad, "the son of strife," in the course of his admonishings 
gives a fine Nature description and draws a lesson for the perfect 
man therefrom. 

The profound truth almost buried in this simple description, 
is this that we can not grow "without the mire." False asceti- 
cism cuts off the rush while it is yet in its greenness, if "the mire" 
is removed or if it is pulled out of its ground. How can "the flag 
grow without water?" Impossible, yet some teachers pretend 
to have the Living Word though they have cut off that root which 
connects them with Intensity or The Eternal Fountain : the Great 
Nature. 

Job quickly answered Bildad : "Of a truth I know that it is so," 
and continues with unbounded admiration his description of the 
great architect. 

Shortly after, Zophar, another of Job's friends, blends his ad- 
monishings with those enthusiastic words : "Canst thou by search- 
ing find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto per- 
fection ?" 



THE GREAT MOTHEK 287 

The refrain sounds in our ears like this: vanity and nothing 
but vanity. Man is even inferior to trees, yet personally Job is 
persuaded that Jahveh will visit him again. Job is revealed not 
only as the patience-man but also as a genuine truth-seeker. 
His words prove his capacity for research. The passages refer- 
red to are numbered as Chapter 28 in the common version and 
also often called Job's Mount of Transfiguration because it 
stands isolated in the book as a poem by itself and expresses 
Job's highest attitude of philosophical religion. The sum total 
of Job's Nature-philosophy is this : "the fear of the Lord, that is 
wisdom and to depart from evil is understanding." And the 
sum total of Job's axiom is this: that we must become recon- 
ciled or come into harmony with Nature or which is the same, 
with the Great Mother's working method. And the Great 
Mother's working method is almost always masculine, because 
life's form is and must be masculine. In the Book of Job, 
Jahveh is the pivot and the actor and stage manager. The 
play is a Mystery-Play and the Great Mother is all of it. Tran- 
scendent wonder! 

Before we come to the closing scene of the drama Elihu speaks 
once more on the glory of existence. 

What can I say to supplement the words of Job, that con- 
templative enthusiast or the descriptions of his friends? Can 
anything be added to these testimonies to the Most High, the 
Great Mother, and her Manifestation through the Workmaster, 
Jahveh? Only this can I say without fear of being gainsaid: 
We may receive the testimony of men, yet "the testimony of God 
is greater" (John v). Yea, because the testimonies are won- 
derful, I have sought them and "I have meditated and thought 
on these things" (Eccl. xxxviii). Let us adore the Mother and 
the Lord in the holy court in which we wander daily and nightly 
and always ! Let us keep silence, that we may listen to the Eter- 
nal Song of the Universe. The Universe is the Holy Temple, 
and it is built by the Most High : "Heaven is my throne, and the 
earth my footstool ; hath not my hands made all these things ?" 
"What other house will you build for me?" Let us leap for joy 
in Nature's colossal and ever open basilica. "It is great and has 
no end — it is high and immense" (Baruch cxi). The mountains 
are altar stones, the thunder, the organ peal and sweet air the in- 



288 THE GREAT MOTHER 

cense. The Open is always impressive and forms the arches and 
columns. The sun and the moon are the lamps and the winds 
whisper the Benedicite. Let us lie down where the forest mur- 
murs and the poetry of common things bring a refreshing sleep 
with visions of the Creator's love; where vapors and mists are 
emisaries of grace and consecrated gifts; where plumed min- 
strels sing among flowers and creeping herbs; where silence 
transfigures thought. Let us listen to the mighty surge, that ebbs 
and swells upon the shore. It is the heaving breast of the Great 
Mother and her baptismal font. The sounds that come from the 
breakers carry the prayerful wishes and sighs of the ocean's up- 
rising petitioners, the future generations. Everywhere the stones 
cry out "ought human lips be mute when inanimate objects seem 
vocal with praise? From everywhere come these mystic and 
strange words Sursum Corda. They come from living splendors, 
from beauty, from the awful calm as well as from dreadful 
avalanches. Let us bow down and lie low when we hear the ter- 
rible eloquence of the tornado and the earthquake; when we see 
the furious fire and when the light smites the eye with intoler- 
able glare; when the ice crushes our hopes and death carries 
away Life. 

Jahveh's "self defence" is the denouement of the drama. In 
the main it is an onslaught upon Job by sarcastic questions. 

Job declares his folly and will repent in dust and ashes. Fin- 
ally Job is restored in all ways. 

In the above delineation of the Book of Job, I have paid at- 
tention in the main to the Nature-Mystery there is in the book 
and either ignored or passed lightly over the Hebrew and other 
theological doctrines involved. 

Those of us who yearn for a fuller soul life are also sensitive 
to Nature's aspects as set forth in the various speeches. We 
feel the life that throbs in them. Not only have we a sense of 
the Infinite, but we have realized many of their features. Nature 
to us is much more than a rich hieroglyphic book. We speak of 
Nature where we should say the Presence. 

The tragedy of the Book of Job is played on many stages 
"while the eternal ages watch and wait." Unfortunately, to most 
people the Inner-Life is no more than romantic poetry. To them 



THE GREAT MOTHER 289 

"Far off the spell-doomed world withdrawn the while, 
Looms like a dim-seen land through dazzling mist." 

Oh! That a study of the Book of Job might lead some of my 
readers to Reality, or^ which is the same, to the Great Mother! 



The Book of Psalms 

The Book of Psalms is mainly lyrical poetry of a religious 
character and aim. It is a collection of songs largely in praise 
of the Great Mother and God, her Workmaster. It is admirably 
suited as a devotional manual. Back of its masculinity lies a 
powerful intensity. 

For my present purpose, I refer to only those Psalms which are 
of a Nature-Mysticism character and pay no attention to the 
individual singer or his age. I endeavor to single out the wonder- 
ful and beautiful sequences which observation forces upon us 
and which the Hebrew poet-singers have described. But I want 
my readers to hear more than poetry. I want them to respect, 
admire and worship that real quality — call it what they will — 
which they hear and which is the essential texture of the Uni- 
verse. If they do that then the poetry of the Psalms shall be to 
them "the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge." 

The reader should begin with the 65th Psalm, a hymn of 
praise to "God," the Great Mother's Workmaster. 

It is clearly a rural thanksgiving song. It is not a confused 
and wild jubilation, but a dignified hymn of praise, rich in 
thought, loveliness and tenderness. God, the Mother's Work- 
master, is celebrated as refuge and strength, "a very present help 
in trouble." The help sent by Jahveh awakens a feeling of kin- 
ship and the heart swells with joy that "the ancient arms are 
beneath" and that "he will be our guide even unto death." With 
a slight change of pronoun from the masculine to the feminine, 
the hymn is addressed to the Great Mother. 

We may well interpret David as the human soul and his 
psalms as the passional expressions of the soul; they certainly 
run through the whole gamut of fiery emotions. Their mountains 
look like the Great Mother's 'hills of holiness" and the valleys 



290 the great mother 

give out deep solitary plaints and bitter cries. Everywhere the 
facts are on fire. 

Why should we not translate these hymns and make them 
songs to the Great Mother? They are "apples of gold, set in a 
network of silver," most suitable for ornaments. The key to the 
eighth Psalm is wonder : we owe it to the Mother. The twenty- 
ninth surpasses all descriptions of a thunder storm: is the 
Mother not in it ? Have we not heard the voice ? Why else has 
the Psalm been translated oftener than the others? And how 
about the one hundredth and fourth? This is the Psalm which 
Humboldt said presented a picture of the entire cosmos ? It calls 
upon all men to bless Jahveh as the Lord of the World and its 
greatness, order and life. The Psalm seems to be patterned upon 
Genesis and has a parallel in Psalm 139. 

The one hundred and thirty-ninth Psalm emphasizes as most 
of the other Psalms the active, plastic world-building energy of 
the Great Mother expressed as it is in masculine terms. 

The way to read the Psalms is like the way to read most of the 
Old Testament. Their form is masculine, because thought is 
masculine, but their substance and power is feminine because 
their purpose is to express the fundamental energy of the uni- 
verse in which the singers triumph and glory. And the funda- 
mental energy is the Eternally-Feminine, the Great Mother. 

Ecclesiasticism Hostile to Nature 

Not all forms of Christianity are hostile to Nature, but most of 
them are. Jesus, Himself, was not opposed. 

The Psalms are full of the glory displayed in Nature, but 
official Judaism looked upon Nature as a fallen angel and that 
Christianity which followed it, did the same. That Christianity 
was a transcendental philosophy rather than a life like that re- 
vealed by Jesus. Hence it despised creation because of the 
entrance of "sin" and held the belief that the world became a 
caricature by the fall. It looked upon the earth as upon an en- 
chantment of the devil and was anti-cosmic in all its teachings. 
But Christianity, of old or of to-day, could not and does not 
avoid the logic of being in the world. While it can refuse and 
does generally refuse the classical joyful views and the beliefs 
that Nature is "the Great Mother of all things," it can not escape 



THE GREAT MOTHER 29I 

all the consequences involved in its doctrine of Providence. That 
doctrine at least makes Nature an instrument in the hands of her 
creator. But the fact remains that Christianity as an ecclesiastic 
system set a deep cleft between Nature and Spirit and that chasm 
is still there. But whi^e Christianity as a system has emphasized 
a dualism that can not be bridged, it discovered the worth in the 
individual and the individual has recognized Nature. 

While Christianity as a philosophical and theocratic ecclesias- 
tic system stands in sharp contrast to Nature and the truth of 
life, Christianity as a theosophic system has created the wonder- 
ful doctrine: The Mother and the Son. 

The Mother and the Son 

The common mind does not know its own ideas nor how they 
have been acquired. It is unaware of growth. It has not ob- 
served that in youth the Mother is the all and most prominent 
factor in its life; nor has it discovered that it is by teaching, it 
has come to its Father idea and has substituted Father for 
Mother. The same process is easily seen in the life of mankind. 
By ecclesiastic teachings mankind has been so stultified, that it 
has lost its power to observe and reflect. And for that reason 
mankind has lost the idea of the true relation of Mother and 
Son in Christianity and the Son has become the only religious 
expression. The true relation is of course that of Nature's own 
make. The Mother is the Foundation, the independent and self- 
subsistent power, and the Son is the executor of her will. And 
that is the tacid understanding of the New Testament. The 
Roman Church has elaborated the ideas very strongly. 

Mary, the Mother of God 

In speaking about the Eternal Mother from no dogmatic stand- 
point, I am at liberty to write down my results drawn from study 
and experience. But the case stands differently when a specific 
view is to be presented, one so different as that about the Virgin 
Mary, of whom the Roman Catholic Church claims to be the only 
one who has a right to speak. 

To state the doctrine of Mary as "the Mother of God" as 
far as the theological side is concerned and in relation to my sub- 
ject the Eternal Mother, I shall fall back upon a book by the 



292 the great mother 

Rev. J. D. Concilio, pastor of St. Michael's Church in Jersey 
City, N. ]., U. S. A. The title of his book is "The Knowledge 
of Mary." It was published by the Catholic Publication Society 
and was duly authorized. The following is the train of his ex- 
position : 

"The incarnation of God in Jesus Christ was a necessity con- 
sequent upon the world's having lost the true idea of God. Men 
wanted an object to worship which they could touch and hear 
and see; something to satisfy that instinct which, ill-directed, 
has resulted in idolatry. That this incarnate God might be in 
full sympathy with man and awaken man's sympathy with him, 
he must be born of a woman, and thus partake of our common 
human nature. But the woman selected for the mother of God 
must be the most perfect of creatures, free from sin, and she 
must also voluntarily consent to fulfill the ministry appointed to 
her. All these requisites Mary possessed, and she is therefore 
by Nature, as well as by her office, exalted above all saints and 
angels as well as above the whole human race. Inasmuch, too, 
as the body born of her was divine, she may properly be called 
the Mother of God, the Spouse of the Father, and tfie Sanctu- 
ary of the Holy Ghost. She is also the Co-redemptrix of Crea- 
tion and the Queen of Heaven, and has over her august Son the 
authority that every mother has over her offspring. Therefore 
all men should honor, venerate, and worship her, and those who 
refuse to do so are estranged from the true Church." 

And these are his words about incarnation : 

"Man wanted a visible, tangible God ; man wanted a God-Man 
like himself, with human nature and faculties, with human feel- 
ings, human sympathy, human sufferings. He had been yearning 
after such a God for forty centuries. So strong had been that 
craving and that aspiration that, for want of a true God-Man, 
he had created to himself gods of all sensible objects around him ; 
he had raised his very passions to that dignity. The theophanies, 
or the manifestations of some divine attribute clothed, so to 
speak, in sensible apparel, had not been sufficient for the Jewish 
people; and that same people, who had adored the angel one 
and three at Mamre, who had seen the lightnings and been ter- 
rified by the thunders of Sinai, who could speak to God at the 



TH3 GREAT MOTHER 293 

foot of the ark, who had seen his column following them and 
guiding them during the night and sheltering them from the Eas- 
tern heats during the day, who had eaten of the manna, and who 
had seen God's shadow in the cloud which took possession of 
Solomon's temple, were not satisfied with all this; they went 
after the gods of the Gentiles, for they, like all humanity, wanted 
a true, visible, tangible God. 

"Man was so steeped in sensible things that none but a man 
like himself, except in sin, could entice him away, and none but 
God could bring him from the knowledge of himself as man to 
the knowledge of himself as God. It required a God-Man — true 
man with body and soul like ours, and true God with his divine 
nature and perfections : a twofold nature human and divine, in 
the unity of one divine personality. Take away any of these 
three elements, and you take away the reasons for which Christ 
is necessary. If he is not man, he can neither suffer for man, 
nor attract him. If he is not God, his sufferings and attractions 
are of no avail. If both his natures do not subsist in one divine 
personality, but each nature has a personality of its own, they are 
two distinct persons, one human, the other divine, and neither of 
them can answer the purpose of humanity." This is the fa- 
miliar statement of the incarnation. Granted the premises, the 
logic is good and to the point. 

About Mary's office in this matter, he writes: "If, therefore, 
we could suppose a woman blessed among women, from whose 
spotless flesh the Word should take a portion and unite it hypo- 
statically to Himself, and unite that same portion to a human soul 
also personally wedded to Him, and that that union should take 
place in the womb of the same blessed one, it would follow that 
such a woman would conceive a body and soul united together 
by the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, a body and soul 
united hypostatically to a divine person — to God ; that she would 
conceive a God ; and that, therefore, she should have the title and 
rights of Mother of God. It is true she would have nothing to do 
with the production of God, which would be an absurdity, but 
she would have all to do in conceiving a nature united hypostat- 
ically to a divine person at the same moment of conception, and 
she would be entitled to the name and rights of Mother of God, 
not by producing God, but by conceiving a nature which is God 



294 THE GREAT MOTHER 

by union — a nature which would subsist or be concrete and in- 
dividualized except through that union. Such was the case 
with Mary." — 

"In one word, the union which exists between Mary and God, 
considering her dignity from this point of view, is that of blood 
relation. She is really and truly related to God by blood, as she 
is really and truly the divine Mother of God. It is evident, 
therefore, that a part of Mary's substance is united hypostatically 
to the divine Word, and is and must be called God in Christ; 
and hence a part which belongs to Mary's immaculate flesh, 
which she can claim as her own in its concrete sense, is God. — 

"The relation with the first Person is that the Eternal Father 
associates Mary with Himself to produce the Son. The temporal 
generation of the Word Incarnate is not distinct from the eter- 
nal generation, but simply the identical one. The Father endows 
Mary, by means of the outpourings of the Holy Ghost, with a 
power of grace corresponding, so to speak, to his natural power 
of generation to produce the same Son. Hence Mary can 
strictly and more properly be called the Spouse of the Eternal 
Father. 

"The Virgin, on the day of the Annunciation, in giving her 
consent to the Incarnation and Redemption not only agreed to 
become the Mother of Jesus Christ the Redeemer, and conse- 
quently, as a representative of the whole human race, to adminis- 
ter to Him His human nature, to be offered and immolated for 
man's redemption, but also to become co-sufferer with Him, so 
that Mary's compassion was to accompany, to go hand in hand 
with, Christ's Passion, both being necessary for the redemption 
of mankind, according to the plan selected by God's wisdom." 

I shall not offer any comment upon the doctrine "that a part 
of Mary's substance is united hypostatically to the divine Word, 
and is and must be called God in Christ," nor that a part of 
Mary's flesh is God. I will only call my reader's attention to 
that mysterious statement. As they will see, it involves the dei- 
fication of Mary. 

The mystery deepens when we hear the following: 
"Finally, this same relation of motherhood implies on the part 
of Mary a kind of authority over Jesus Christ — the authority of 



THE GREAT MOTHER 295 

a parent over his offspring." It is true our Lord was God, and, as 
such, no creature could have authority over him; consequently, 
if we limit our observation strictly to his person, Mary could 
claim no authority over Jesus. 

"But then this is trwe of the Eternal Father also, who, strictly 
speaking, can have no authority over his Son's personality, as 
he is God, co-equal and consubstantial with him. 

"But as the Eternal Father is the principle of the Word, he 
can claim authority over him — an authority not of superiority 
on the part of the Father, nor of inferiority on the part of the 
Son, but an authority of order; so that the word is subject to 
the Father, not because inferior in Nature to him, but because 
dependent upon him for his personality. So Mary can claim 
authority over Jesus Christ, not, by any means, because she is 
superior to, or even equal with, her Son, but because she is his 
mother; and, consequently, Jesus is subject to her, because de- 
pendent upon her for his human nature." 

And Mary is the "coredemptrix of the human race": 

"Mary's consent implied two things: First — As a representa- 
tive of the whole human race, as the hostage and surety of man- 
kind, as St. Augustine calls her, she consented to administer to 
the Divine Word His human nature, which he was to immolate 
for man. Second — She consented to undergo all the anguish 
and sorrow and martyrdom consequent upon her from the sacri- 
fice and immolation of her divine Son, to join her compassion 
to his passion, in order to redeem mankind. In one word, she 
consented to become the coredemptrix of the human race. 

"We have insisted on the second side of Mary's dignity that 
she was the arbiter of the works of God. Upon her consent the 
incarnation took place, and upon her consent, foreknown and 
supposed, all that went before the incarnation was made and 
effected. Now, one and the chiefest of these works was the re- 
demption of mankind from original and actual sin and their 
consequences, and it was effected by the free deliberate consent of, 
and the necessary qualifications on the part of Mary." 

As a result of this exalted position, Mary has an infinitude of 
spiritual graces. Of these our author speaks in the words of the 
Jesuit, Father Ricardus: 



296 THE GREAT MOTHER 

"Suppose the space between the earth and the stars to be filled 
with so many grains, and suppose every grain to contain 10,000 
smaller grains, each representing an angel endowed with as 
much grace as an angel arrived at his utmost perfection must 
have: and suppose Mary to have exercised 200 acts of charity 
the first 200 quarters of an hour of her life — the result would be 
that the amount of Mary's grace would be equal to 1,596,938,044 
planets equal to ours, filled up with grains of mustard seed, each 
grain containing 10,000 smaller grains, each representing an 
angel or an apostle with so much grace and multitude of merits 
as had the supreme angel at the summit of his perfection; that 
is to say, that the grace of Mary in the first 200 quarters of an 
hour of her life, supposing her grace at the first moment of her 
conception to have been superior to that of all angels and saints 
by one degree, exceeded in number 1,996,988,044 worlds, each 
full of grains, and each grain representing 10,000 angels, and 
each endowed with as much grace as St. Michael, the highest 
and the sublimest angel." 

From this materialistic measuring of graces, I now quote our 
author on Mary's relation to the Trinity: 

"God has a twofold life — one absolute and internal, one rel- 
ative and external. In his absolute and internal life he is cap- 
able of development and perfection. His external life is the 
manifestation which he has been pleased to make of his infinite, 
internal excellence by means of the works he has effected. Now, 
every one knows that God has not manifested himself all at once, 
but by degrees and stages, each degree and stage increasing the 
manifestation of God's perfections. In his external life, there- 
fore, God is capable of development and completion ; and in this 
sense we assert that Mary has completed the Trinity — of that 
completion which does not fall upon God's nature, attributes, or 
personalities, but upon the external manifestation of his infinite 
life. 

"Mary was actually the effort, so to speak, of the Holy Ghost. 
He, being barren in the bosom of God, wished to become fruitful 
outwardly, and therefore took his nest in the soul of Mary, and 
so lavished upon her all his gifts, so concentrated in her the 
fulness of his graces and gifts, so as to make her conceive and 



TH£ GREAT MOTHER 297 

bring forth a divine Person, who was nothing but the bud and 
blossom, the sweetest and tenderest, the most beautiful flower of 
grace and sanctity." 

Mary's ministrations are defined as follows: 

"The mediation of : the saints is limited to certain graces, to 
certain places, to certain persons. Mary is a universal agent, 
whose power extends upon all places, all times, all good, all evil 
over the whole world. Universal patroness of mankind, mother 
of men, God has given her a heart in proportion to that ministry, 
and has poured out into it a charity which embraces in its soli- 
tude and tenderness all her children. What he has done in small 
proportion for each one of our mothers, he has done on a colossal 
scale for the Holy Virgin. He has made her Mother, as he is 
Father. 

"The second distinctive trait of Mary's mediation is no less 
incomparable — its efficacy. The saints are not always heard — 
whether God does not reveal to them that which is the greatest 
good for him for whom they pray, or because the sins of the 
latter are too great and the meritorious relation between the 
saints and Jesus Christ is limited, or because their merit is more 
particularly included in the order and course of ordinary provi- 
dence, which they cannot move except in a certain measure. But 
it is different in Mary's case. To her maternal charity it has 
been given to know God's secrets, and to see all in that mirror 
of truth which is her Son; to have all power with him, even so 
far as to cause in a certain sense the decrees of Providence to be 
changed, as the anticipation of the miracle at Cana seems to in- 
dicate. Full herself of grace, there is no grace which she cannot 
obtain, being in immediate relation with its source, and that grace 
from her heart is poured out upon ours. 

"This ministry is therefore included in the divine maternity. 
From the moment the Virgin Mother conceived in her womb the 
divine Word, one may say that she obtained a sort of jurisdic- 
tion over the outpourings of graces and gifts of the Holy Ghost, 
of which she had the fulness. As no ray can be drawn from the 
centre of a circle unless it passes through the circumference, so 
no grace can be drawn from the heart of Jesus except it pass 
through her who surrounded him, according to the sublime ex- 



298 THE) GREAT MOTHER 

pression of the Scripture, 'Faemina circumdabit virum' — a woman 
shall encompass a man." 

Consequently Mary is the queen of heaven : "Being the 
Mother of God, the arbiter of God's exterior works, the core- 
demptrix of mankind, the most perfect of all human creatures 
in gifts of nature, the most perfect of creatures in privileges of 
grace, the happiest of all creatures in glory, she deserves an 
honor far above all created intelligences, as she towers above them 
all, and therefore is the queen in honor. 

"She is queen in power — first, in consequence of her magnifi- 
cent sanctity. It is sanctity which makes a creature powerful 
with God, as it is that which makes the creature beloved and 
cherished by God. In this lies the reason of the power of the 
saints. They are friends of God, the chosen ones of his love, 
and cherished of his heart, and they are therefore powerful with 
him. Who among the saints so cherished as Mary? Who so 
much loved as that tower of sanctity ? Who more intimate with 
God than this miracle of his goodness? 

"She is the mother of Him to whom all power has been given 
in heaven and on earth ; and as once the mother of Solomon, sit- 
ting at the right hand of her son, could obtain all things from 
him, as he felt that nothing could be denied to a mother, like- 
wise the magnificent Mother of Jesus, sitting at his right hand, 
can dispose of his omnipotence and of his infinite merits in be- 
half of mankind. 

"Mary is the instrumental cause of creation, of redemption, 
of grace, and of glory. These things would never have taken 
place except she had given her consent. All angels, therefore, 
owe Mary their creation their redemption, the grace which sanc- 
tifies them, the grace which makes them persevere, and the 
grace which glorifies. 

"Is she not, then, as instrumental cause in all the exterior 
works of God, entitled to a supremacy of power? 

"No wonder, then, that she is styled Queen of angels, Queen 
of patriarchs, of prophets, of apostles, of martyrs, of virgins, 
of confessors — the glorious Queen of heaven and earth." 

I have stated enough of the Roman Catholic doctrine of Mary. 
To enter upon an analysis and comparison with that which I 



THE GREAT MOTHER 299 

have gathered from many sources about the Great Mother would 
be useless. It ought to be evident to my readers that the Church's 
dogmatics crushes the life out of great truths. It will also appear 
that the Church has only proclaimed a very small part of the 
Wisdom of the Agest 

Madonnas and the Great Mother 

The Roman Church has for some centuries paid special wor- 
ship to the Virgin Mary. In that I have seen a realization of the 
Great Mother, though the form was limited. Nevertheless the 
increasing veneration offered the Virgin by new dogmas also 
points to an increasing understanding of the Great Mother. In 
spite of this, it must be admitted that Christendom has forgot- 
ten the Mother of Mankind and pays more attention to her Son, 
than to her. Having forgotten its mother, mankind has lost real 
life, real religion. Mankind has ideas, has general notions about 
the Deity, but does not live a personal life in communion with 
Deity. 

I will speak about the Virgin and begin with the New Testa- 
ment story. It is rather remarkable that the Gospels give so 
much space to the story of Mary, as for instance, Luke. It was 
to be expected of Luke, who was a physician. It is easy to read 
the mystic sense of Luke's details for instance. The Gnostics 
read the Gospel of Mary as a Cosmic drama and so may we and 
so we ought, because it is only in the light of the World-drama 
that Jesus can be understood. Luke is the most broadminded of 
the evangelists. His gospel is the Gospel of Humanity. The 
savior to him is the savior of the world and not of a particular 
race. He knows the meaning of prayer as only an initiate 
knows it. Luke most emphatically and most distinctly teaches 
the greatness of woman in relation to Jesus. He has translated 
the Eternal Song that all Mystics can hear and have heard as 
long as the world was and shall hear as long as the world shall 
last. His translation of the Eternal Song is the Magnificat and 
now chanted in so many churches — and not understood. It is 
woman teaching in the church forever yet without usurping 
authority ! 

Browning's finest lyric is his Magnificat. It is Pippa Passes 
among the Liturgies of the world. In Pippa Passes Nature is 



/ 



30O THE GREAT MOTHER 

brought in, and in full sympathy with the human element. The 
whole Magnificat is in these lines 

God's in His heaven 



All's right with the world, 

and Woman is the World Savior. 

Luke's Gospel is the Gospel of poetry and creates a religion of 
beauty and always with woman as the officiating minister. And 
the Woman is the Great Mother. We hear her chant every- 
where between the lines. 

The strongest characteristic of the ancient religions is the con- 
ception of the Divine Being as Mother and not as Father. Not 
only were the ancient religions full of the Mother idea, but the 
social systems were, too. The heroes of the land were des- 
cribed as sons of the goddess, and, at death they returned to the 
Mother, who bore them. Even to-day we still say that we re- 
turn to mother-earth, when we pass out. The male element in 
the Deity was in those days conceived as the secondary figure. 
The God was only a help to the Mother in her Great Work as 
Mother, as protector and educator. It was particularly where 
life was lived in the Open ; where great plateaus or wide stretches 
give habitation to men, that the mystery of the Mother Goddess 
was known. The Open means abyss — space — receptivity — im- 
pressibility — freedom, all that which enlarges us. We have for- 
gotten the Mother because we have chosen the narrow views of 
the city. 

The Mother Goddess must not be thought of under sexual 
character, at least not as the ancient initiate knew her. That the 
vulgar herd thought of her under the form of sex, does not con- 
cern me. I am speaking in Universals. The Mother goddess 
must be thought of as Nature, as that ever renewing or regen- 
erating power, which keeps life agoing without an end. Every 
Spring the Mother bears a child : renews life. In the light of that 
idea we shall understand the child Jesus, the Christ. He is a 
cosmic phenomenon and therefore also a social factor and re- 
generator or redeemer. 

With this idea we can read the New Testament as a drama 
of divine life and shall know how to worship the Great Mother. 



THE) GREAT MOTHER 301 

In the ancient rituals, the Great Mother is personally the essen- 
tial and most important figure. The god is only an adjunct 
needed for the development of life. 

Of the ancient rituals, I shall not now speak. For the present 
I wish to recall my reader to the Great Mother. 

A few of these ideas about ancient Mother goddess have sur- 
vived in Christianity in various forms. 

The Christian artist has always been in trouble when he 
tried to represent the Trinity. The trouble arises from his de- 
sire to idealize. But the Trinity is no ideal. Christianity calls 
its revelation an historic fact, an actuality, and that makes 
trouble, because Art is not and can not be an actuality. 

When the Christian artist, for instance in the cathedral of 
Montpellier, attempted to represent the Trinity, he did it by giv- 
ing one figure three faces. The elder Holbein and Maitre 
Etienne Chevalier* did it by making a group of three figures 
exactly alike in every respect. Sometimes Christian artists have 
painted the Trinity under the forms of an old man, a young man 
and the two holding a dove between them, by the hand. All 
such attempts are, to say the least, crude. They do not solve the 
problem. The mystery of the Trinity is this, that the three are 
one and that mystery no artist has solved and it can not be solved 
by any craft. 

Albert Diirer has produced what appears to me the most satis- 
factory — unsatisfactory as it is — solution. He painted God, the 
Father, holding the crucified Son in the lap and the whole was 
surrounded and illuminated by angels and spirits, who of course, 
were meant to represent the Holy Spirit. The whole is woven 
into one as far as it seems possible. Its leading idea seems to 
me to be a presentation of the process of salvation rather than the 
three personalities. 

Christian art on the other hand has been very successful in 
painting the Mother of God, the Virgin. Note ! I say the Mother 
of God, not the Mother of Jesus, because I am not speaking 
about the ordinary Madonna. I speak of four types of presen- 
tations of the Eternal Mother. My reader may call them Ma- 
donnas — but they are much more. 



* See Brentano " Miniatures in Frankfort-on-the-Main." 



302 the: great mother 

The first I will mention is by an unknown painter of the 
Umbrian school. It represents a blending of spiritual and bod- 
ily purity, not possible in an earthly woman, yet the painting is 
so truly a mother, that I must call her "the blessed one among 
women," the queen of creation. The painting, in my opinion, 
is not that of a Madonna, though called so, it is the Great Mother, 
the Mother of the World. 

The second type I see in Niccola Pasano's work. This Mother 
of God is thoroughly classical in character. The whole of Greece 
and Rome is in this masterwork. 

The third is an old mosaic where the God-mother looks like 
the Phrygian goddess. The figure is placed in the midst of 
numerous symbols, but these, like the Divine Child, are so skil- 
fully arranged that they form one figure: the Mother. It is the 
Great Mother represented as a burning furnace of violent pas- 
sions. We smell the myrrh and cassia. Puritanic minds call 
the Phrygian goddess voluptuous. But the Puritans never heard 
the song of life and never saw the mystery of Nature's division 
of labor in the act of reproduction, hence it can not understand. 

The fourth and crowning picture is the unsurpassed painting 
by Raphael : the Madonna di San Sisto in the Dresden Museum. 
She is both Mother and Virgin. The extremes are harmonized. 
One gets the impression that Raphael has wanted to tell us that 
motherhood restores woman's virginity; that even a fallen wom- 
an is made divine by officiating as mother in the service of the 
Great Mother. To understand Raphael's idea and the mystery he 
would express, the beholder must draw the figure of the Vesjjica 
Piscis or Oval, as it is called, around it for it belongs to it. 
With this third element the Madonna di San Sisto becomes a 
true presentation of the Trinity: Mother-Son-Spirit. 

This figure of Raphael's satisfies the four fundamental claims 
of Art. It is enthusiasm manifested in such a way that our 
image-making faculty at once grasps its idea and sees most of 
the world of the Subconscious revealed in human form. Again, 
Raphael's figure stands forth in enormous strength of immedi- 
ateness. This second characteristic is probably unknown to most 
visitors who have seen the painting. Only a loving eye can di- 
vine the eternal purpose of a strong form and only the inner ear 
can hear the eloquence of its lines. In these two characteris- 



THE GREAT MOTHER 303 

tics, I see the apostolic and evangelistic offices, such as I have 
defined them elsewhere. The Great Mother is, of course, the 
power and energy of them. If you wish to understand me thor- 
oughly, look up a good photograph of this Madonna and hang 
it up in your room f or meditation in honor of the Great Mother. 

The third characteristic of the Madonna di San Sisto which 
makes her the God Mother is the rhythm of movement shown 
everywhere in the figure. There are no straight lines anywhere ; 
but everywhere melody and always under the severest control 
of law. Only great creative power could have painted her. It 
is as if the Great Mother had drawn all the lines herself and 
shown Raphael that although she uses space and time in her 
work, she herself is not space or time. This third characteristic 
of Raphael's presents the Great Mother as the prophetic witness, 
as Life. 

The fourth characteristic of true Art as seen in this Madonna 
is Truth. Art is Truth in sensuous form. The Great Mother 
as we can conceive her is Truth in the sensuous form of life, 
such as we know life. No artistic eye trained to see form and 
expression can fail to understand the truth of Raphael's drawing 
of this human form and its meaning, nor can a Nature-Mystic 
fail to see Spirit made visible in this figure or fail to realize that 
this visible figure is a sacramental form of the invisible. All these 
four characteristics demanded by true Art are present in Raphael's 
Madonna di San Sisto and the two last ones represent the Great 
Mother as she appears to us in the offices we call prophetic and 
pastoral. The first two characteristics are flames that destroy 
the impure. The two last are white light and illumination. 

Besides noting that which I said in speaking about the two 
first characteristics, I want my reader to examine the painting 
again and look intensely and there shall be discovered traits of 
Kali and the Phrygian goddess ; not these goddesses in their hid- 
eous forms, but they shall be seen as they appear in the deadly 
blue evening air which sweeps over a swamp or meadow. If 
one looks intently into her eyes a far off view shall be perceived, 
absorbed, as it were, in the dread realities of life and death. 
Such is the Mother's staring at us at times, herself wondering 
why she is the Dark Mother. In the boldly raised head and 
strong neck we may read a wild and untamed Nature, unsubdued 



•;_ 1 ■ ■ ■■i n 1 



304 THE GREAT MOTHER 

as the icefields of Greenland and the monmouth icebergs they 
send floating into the tracks of man's ships and canoes. In all 
of it we may perceive the Mother as she is met with in the Open, 
for instance, when the ocean lies dark in the moonless night. She 
may be dreadful at such times. She is as resistless as the iceberg. 
And that is the Hindu Kali, the Mother. All this is unknown or 
has been forgotten except by the initiates, the Mystics and the 
Inner-Life people. But while Mary and her mystery has been for- 
gotten or is unknown, Jesus and His mystery is not ignored in 
the same degree. 

Jesus in the Open. The Preacher of the Eternally-Feminine 

In another book,* I have spoken of Jesu parables as flesh and 
life of our life, because they have the humanity of universal 
humanity in them. And such a key unlocks all the mysteries of 
Jesu relation to the Great Mother. "J esus " as said Renan, "is 
at once very idealistic in his conceptions and very materialistic 
in his expressions." I said further: "We do not attain freedom 
by any ever so exalted knowledge of the mystery of life, even by 
sympathy. We must assimilate the world, and that means to love 
it; and, that again means to love it as flesh of our flesh and 
altogether as ourselves. To be such a lover seems almost im- 
possible; yet if we would be free we must enter into such a fa- 
miliarity with all parts of existence. Jesu way or method of 
such a familiarity was this : He saw all things in God ; He at- 
tributed spirituality to all things. He saw the mountain as any 
one might see a mountain, but it meant to Him a sermon on the 
constitution of the eternal kingdom. The lilies of the field smiled 
with innocence and the waving grain led His thoughts to the 
ocean of nations, storm tossed and restless. Rocks and sands 
suggested foundations for eternal temples and frail self-help. 
The little sparrow became an emblem upon providential care, and 
the reed bending before the wind showed that non-resistance 
saves from breaking. He had the eye to see through the veils. 
Everything was transparent and revealed itself through the thin 
covering called Nature. He was more than a friend of Nature, 
He was personally related. And the human activities of the 



* "Jesus, a poet, a prophet, a mystic and a man of freedom. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 305 

daily life around Him were living thoughts, sisters and brothers ; 
wine-growing, sheep-herding, fishing, house-cleaning, traveling, 
planning, and so forth, all symbolized in some form or other the 
quest for the infinite, the spirit of beauty, the essential life, the 
empire of love, and so -forth. They were like Himself, problems, 
teachers, forces, and witnesses, about communion with His god. 
He can teach us to spiritualize all material things, and how to 
lift them into their ideal reality. He can also teach us how to 
illustrate the spiritual by the material, how to clothe a far-reach- 
ing thought in a garment that makes it very present to sense. In 
spirit He met all things. Spirit was His and their meeting 
ground and mediation. He passed by all the incidental and saw 
only the real values of life. He lifted all details into a higher 
potential power, or rather saw them in their essence. The stream 
of His consciousness came from the mountains and the freedom 
of the Open. Hence its mystic tendency and passionate serenity. 
The high roads of Palestine became the Path. The Desert meant 
self-communion. Bread and wine were communion. In all 
this were both the theosophy of the Great Mother and symbols 
of the inter-relationship of all members of the human family. 
The storm He knew well enough, He, too was as severe as the 
Great Mother can be, and like her He smiled also and called to 
come up higher. His reproofs had a profound human color in 
them. Jesu* mountain teaching was significant. He hailed 
from Galilea, where they saw little of sacrifices of bulls and 
goats, such as in Jerusalem. Significantly we hear nothing from 
him about sacrifices and offerings. His teachings and thoughts 
rather reverberate with the words of Isaiah (44:23) 

Break forth into singing, ye mountains; 
O forest, and every tree therein. 

His mind and heart must often have been troubled with the 
ecstacy of the Great Mother, such as she leaves her Presence 
among mountains and upon high places. No doubt He climbed 
the limestone cliffs behind and above Nazareth in the early morn- 
ing and He probably often watched the sun's course across the 

* Compare my articles " The Inner-I,ife and Jesus, the Christ," in "The Word" 1912, 
particularly the 7th article. 



306 THE GREAT MOTHER 

heaven and the country before Him. The scenery before Him 
far and wide must have roused the latent god-wisdom in Him. 
The scenery told more than the law that "righteousness shall 
shine forth like the sun" and we can hear the echo of His teach- 
ings. The views were wisdom, seeing the infinite in the fruits. 
They transformed Him as mountain views do those who will 
admit them. They make for likeness. The landscape shows the 
Mother's face. Bathed in the light, Jesus saw from the cliffs, 
the hillsides clothed with golden gorse, acres of blue lupins or 
purple salvia, fifty varieties of clover in flowers; cream colored 
cistus and lilies of greatest variety and profusion. No wonder, 
because Palestine seems to be "the garden of Eden run wild with 
flowers." 

Flowers are so many visible heartbeats of the Great Mother 
Nature. Flowers arouse a yearning pensiveness and naturally 
they would stir His sense of Messiahship. Flowers are colored 
pages in Nature's book and they spell lessons in the Eternal 
Gospel. And Jesus must have read many a lesson in His re- 
tirements. From the cliffs Jesus must have seen many rainbows, 
"that everlasting sign that shall not be cut off." Could the imag- 
inative Jesus see a rainbow and not think of Ezekiel's vision of 
the rainbow which was "the appearance of the likeness of the 
glory of Jahveh," the workmaster of the Great Mother, and, not 
realize Himself and His kinship? Impossible! "The glory of 
Jahveh" was Shekinah, a Femininity. The vision must have en- 
veloped Him; He must have felt the Great Mother's embrace 
upon the mountain. 

From Mary, He must have learned that the Hebrews called 
thunder "the voice of Jahveh". He must have heard thunder 
very often and listened to that peculiar personal character which 
there is in it. The Great Mother's voice must have trembled into 
His innermost and then left that thunder with which He later on 
cleansed the temple and swept out all the bad influences of 
selfishness, like a thunderstorm clears the atmosphere of miasma. 
Like the thunderstorm reestablishes natural balance, so He re- 
stored order. Jesus must have been on the same cliffs in His 
youth over night, just as He later spent the night in the Open. 
How serene are not the stars? They know absolutely nothing 
about human interests. We do not even fall in love with them. 






THE GREAT MOTHER 307 

They are too distant and cold. The man Jesus must have disap- 
peared completely when the stars looked upon Him. Jesus must 
have been in the Christ office already as a boy when He saw the 
starlit heavens. The influences of Space, the solemnity of Time, 
the solitude and silence must all have worked to create and 
recreate the Christ work. The Christ consciousness comes out 
of sublime transformations. 

Old authors, many of the church fathers and hermits, draw 
parallels between Jesus and the objects of His environment and 
thus they give Him names characteristic of these natural ob- 
jects. They call Him the sun, a star of light, a stone, a rock, 
fire, water, a tree, the vine, a lamb; in short, comparisons have 
been found with elements from all the kingdoms of Nature. I 
have found two hundred names of that kind. Such naming is 
not accidental or meaningless. The religious felt a correspond- 
ence and naturally so; they felt Jesus as the living type of Na- 
ture; the Mother's only son, by whom and for whom She man- 
ifested Herself. 

Quite characteristically Jesus Himself uses similar names for 
His disciples and followers. In that lies the same meaning as 
in the similar names given to Him. His disciples and real fol- 
lowers were so many cosmological facts, nature forces and not 
mere men. There is, however, this difference in the method, that 
Jesus is called the living water, the living bread, the living fire, 
etc., where they are merely water, bread, fire, etc. As a result 
of this method of naming, it is clear that we should not talk 
about Jesu biography but rather about His cosmic character, 
about Him as cosmology. By removing Him from biography 
to cosmology, we come to the truth about Jesus, and only then. 
Jesus is not a man, He is Man, the Cosmos as Man. 

Hereafter, my reader will read the Gospel story as a descrip- 
tion of Nature's banquet or table set with beauties made out of 
Eternal Thoughts such as the Great Mother constantly bears 
them, and mixed with Everlasting Love, such as the Great 
Mother nourishes it! After reading the Gospel stories of the 
four Evangelists in that way my reader will understand that 
that which he hitherto has called Nature is the Sacramental 
Table of the Great Mother and that Jesus presides at that table. 

The peculiarity of the Gospels as narrated by the four is this : 



308 THE GREAT MOTHER 

that "the impersonal" phenomena so called have been made 
personal and described in a biographical way. The Gospels are 
really Nature-pictures personally told for easier comprehension. 

Jesus and the Natural Rhythm of Palestine 

We can not understand Jesus and His relation to the Great 
Mother unless we see Him as an expression of the Holy Land 
and see the Holy Land as an expression of Him. It sounds 
mysterious when I make such a statement and there certainly is 
a mystery in it. But in the same way as our bodily members 
serve different purposes and therefore are organized differently, 
so the different surfaces of the earth serve different purposes. 
Some lands are called "holy" or "sacred" because they are or 
have been consecrated to the Inner-Life, others are not. The 
district of Benares is sacred to Buddhists; the Merv district 
with its innumerable firecraters was holy to Zoroastrians and 
Palestine is the Holy Land of the Gospel. 

I can show some peculiarities of Palestine which connect it 
with the Incarnation and which give it the "sacred" or con- 
secrated character. Kabbalism knows the mystery. I will give 
a few of the main traits of that Mysticism in order to show, as 
I said above that the Holy Land is an expression of Jesus, and 
Jesus is an expression of the Holy Land. Palestine naturally di- 
vides itself into three (4) parts geographically. In the south 
is Judea or "Foundation" according to the law of Fourfoldness. 
Above it to the north is Samaria with Gilead across Jordan. It 
answers to the Solar plexus region of the body. Further to the 
north is Galilea, "the circle" which answers to the head and breast 
in the Grand Man according to Kabbalah. North of Galilea is 
again what was called an "outside" region not yet fully "incor- 
porated" in the main body: The Crown. It is not necessary to 
separate this tract of land. It is also called Northern Galilea 
and Galilea proper is then south Galilea and the two are one. 

Jesu life moves rhythmically according to this division and it 
follows time and seasons and expresses the greatest truths in 
perfect harmony with its forms. My reader will marvel when I 
show Jesus walking up and down and systematically through 
the land called holy, teaching truths which correspond to the 
character of His surroundings and to the quality of the season 






THE GREAT MOTHER 309 

of the year. My reader will also come to see and wonder at the 
relationship between His acts and doings and His environment. 
Everything, every thought, every act, is consistent. I want to 
point with much emphasis upon the significance of Jesu rest- 
lessness and frequent^ journeys up and down the Holy Land. 
Very little attention has been paid to it in the various lives which 
have been written, and, for that reason these lives all lack a nat- 
ural background; they reek with dogmatism and the cosmic life 
of the Master is ignored. In contradistinction to all the ancient 
teachers and founders of religion Jesus was restless, was incar- 
nate mobility, a current, a stream rising and setting by the tide. 
And all His teachings have the same elasticity. They resemble 
a running fire seen at night in the underbrush on a wooded hill. 
I have sometimes tried to understand Jesu teaching after the 
method of those who have never, or rarely, left the city but I 
find it impossible to grasp anything of it. Like most of the 
ancient teachers known to us by name and classed in the same 
category, Jesus was accustomed to spend nights under the open 
sky or retire to the desert for peace, hence the vast views of His 
teachings. And He did not choose city people as his interpreters. 
Would Jesus ever have become the Christ if He had studied 
at a high school? Could an academic education fit Him? 

Had He been a pupil of the schools, His teachings would have 
been arid intellectualism and His life pedantic. He could not 
have come so close to life as He did, and He would not have 
been a guide of souls but only a mentor of minds. He would 
have taught philosophical categories, but no parables, and His 
life would have been molded on the same arrogant lines as 
pedagoges move in, even to-day. 

Look at the difference between Paul and Jesus and the natural- 
ness, the freshness of Jesus is apparent immediately. Paul comes 
perilously near disaster. Paul was a traveler too, but he was 
decidedly a missionary and traveled for a purpose. But the nar- 
ratives relating to Jesu life do not call Him a traveler but a Wan- 
derer and in that lies the difference between Paul and Himself 
and the beauty of Jesu life. The Wanderer has time and leisure 
to commune with the natural surroundings ; not so a traveler ; he 
is aiming at a definite point. Study the method of life revealed 
by Walt Whitman and Wordsworth and you see their vitality 



310 the; great mother 

bursting through the limits of conventionality imposed upon 
them. The city could not furnish them enough elbow-room and 
the streets were too narrow for their thoughts. Hence they be- 
came wanderers ; but they lived and toiled for the city, neverthe- 
less. The refrain of their song was constantly "come out into 
the Open ; you are suffocating in the miasma of city shabbiness." 

I have laid much stress upon what I have called the restless- 
ness of Jesus and have described it by retelling the story of His 
life lived in journeys up and down Palestine. I have done so be- 
cause these journeys of His, reveal much better than any other 
method, I think, that we attain knowledge of God through suc- 
cessive unfoldings of existence and never wholly at any one time 
or suddenly. We must live into knowledge of the Great Mother, 
we can not read ourselves into it or think ourselves into it. And 
above all, these wanderings, this restlessness of Jesus reveals the 
relationship of the Inner-Life and the outer and His nearness 
to the Great Mother. 

As was the outer, so was the inner. His teachings have that 
richness about them which the fresh air gives the flower. They 
are rich with sap like the clover, which drinks the morning dew 
and breathes a Hallelujah of peace at sunset. They have that 
eternal renaissance of passion in them which can never be killed 
by bad translations. Take His words individually or isolated; 
take any sentence and no matter which way you dwell upon them, 
they show you the eternal loom on which their beauty was woven. 
Jesu journeys are an index to the occult lore of the four gospels. 
Few only know the significance. If a botanist will apply his 
knowledge in plant physiology to the study of these wanderings 
up and down he shall soon compare them to the rise and fall 
of the sap in the plant and see more than one meaning in Jesu 
being the tree of life, the vine, etc. — 

Judea, the southern part of Palestine, is secluded and not 
traversed by the highways from Egypt. On one side is the Dead 
Sea and on the other, narrow valleys flanked by steep moun- 
tains; both separate this part of the Palestinean organism and 
indicate that it has something secret about it. Correspondentially 
the Desert or Judean mountains give Judea the character of 
Wildness, a designation of vast moral significance and symbol- 
ism, when it is remembered that it was in the Desert or the 



THE GREAT MOTHER 311 

Wilderness that Jesus was tempted. His victory there began 
that ministry which received its main spiritual character in Gal- 
ilea. 

The whole of Palestine is topographically characterized as a 
great chasm running from south to north through the entire 
length of the country. This topography finds its terms of expres- 
sion best in the intense passion of Judea. Judea is hot, wild, 
aboriginal, bloody and sexual. In modern terms, drawn from 
Mohammedanism and Kabbalism, Jerusalem, the chief city of 
Judea, is called "the sanctuary" a term purely occult. Judaism 
or the religion of Judea in the narrow sense, is still called "a 
river of God full of living waters" which has a mystic sense 
understood only by the Occultists. In Judea the Great Mother 
showed some of her stern and terrible side of character equal 
to earthquakes and convulsions, muddy caves and wadys. It 
was here Jesus suffered and began His life. 

Samaria was called a half heathen country, viz., a midregion. 
The road through Samaria was unsafe on account of the feuds 
of the two rival people; a fact corresponding to the unsettled 
principles of the region, something answering to the passional 
life of the solar plexus region of the body. Samaria is more 
pleasant than Judea, both as a country and as regards its people. 
These were largely of Assyrian stock and settled here after the 
original Israelites were carried away into captivity. They did 
not take part in the rebuilding of the Temple after the return 
from captivity, signifying undefined passion. They raised a 
temple of their own on Mt. Gerizim, an ancient "high place" or 
nervecentre so to say, to speak Kabbalistically. Even to this day, 
a small remnant of Samaritans at Nabulus perform annually the 
pashal sacrifice on the top of Mt. Gerizim. Under influence of 
the Great Mother, Jesus did not recognize the narrow feelings of 
race. He recognized the psychic power of the region in His 
parable of the Good Samaritan; He commended the faith and 
spiritual insight of that Samaritan who out of the ten lepers 
healed, returned with thanks; He revealed a heavenly mystery 
in His conversation with a woman of Samaria and many Sa- 
maritans believed His message. The Apostles witnessed in 
Samaria and gained some success. Samaria is still Samaria and 
three times a year, at the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of 
21 



312 THE GREAT MOTHER 

weeks and the feast of tabernacles they make a pilgrimage to 
the sacred Mt. Gerizim. They celebrate all the Mosaic festivals 
and at the Passover they offer sacrifices. All of which shows 
that the Great Mother has still use for the Midregion and Kab- 
balistically she still reveals herself in the solar plexus region 
and communicates herself. But only the strong and the initiates 
can understand her and are permitted the use of the mysteries. 
Galilea in the time of Jesus included fourfoldness, namely, 
the territories given to Asher, Naphtali, Z ebulon and Issach ar 
or "the mountains of happiness"; it was the land which should 
see the Messianic light. Galilea also held the richest and most 
fertile land of all Palestine, the territory of Issachar which also 
witnessed historical events of great interest. If Galilea is called 
the head of the body in Kabbalistic language it certainly justifies 
the designation. It is fourfold by its component parts and by 
Asher again fourfold. Asher had four sons and his tribe had 
most male children and the most beautiful women. He himself 
was the eighth son of Jacob. His tribe was renowned for wis- 
dom and his land rich in oil. Naphtali "the wrestler" could 
boast of Barak, "lightning", an intellectual quality which deliver- 
ed Israel from long and severe oppression, characteristic of the 
gospel that came from Galilea later on. Zebulon means "habi- 
tation," and though it seems singular, its glory lies in falling into 
"idolatry" and in not driving out the natives when the tribe took 
possession of the land assigned it. The tribe, however, bore a 
prominent part in the great victory celebrated by Deborah and 
Barak. It also assisted Gideon and David. In all this the Great 
Mother added intelligence to Jesu environment and receptivity 
for foreign ideas without which Jesus could not have done her 
work. Issachar's tribe was made up of laborious people, ad- 
dicted to rural employments, the very foundation of the Great 
Mother's work for her children. She begins to work for them 
by Art, arare: to plow. In the north of Palestine are some 
celebrated Mountains. Mt. Hermon is 9,000 feet high and means 
in Mohammedan mystic language "the chief mountain", and that 
is quite characteristic when it is remembered that it was the 
mountain of transfiguration. The "top is partially covered with 
snow during the whole year. From Mt. Hermoh Jesus had a 
view of vast extent. The Holy Land "Ties far below, Spread out 



THE GREAT MOTHER 313 

like a gigantic relief map." Kabbalistically the head overlooks 
the whole body and is rich. Wisdom, like Mt. Hermon, is 
remarkable for abundant dew. At the foot of Mt. Hermon lies 
Caesarea Philippi where Jesus was just before the transfigura- 
tion. Much Kabbalisjn connects with Caesarea Philippi. It lies 
in Iturea, which means "an enclosed region". It was here Peter 
called Jesus "the son of God." Much more could be written on 
the natural characteristics of Palestine or the Great Mother's 
"holy land" but enough has been said to explain the country's 
human character and thereby giving a key to Jesus and His 
works as an expression of Mother Nature's will and way. 
"With words man interchanges thoughts; by forms of art he 
interchanges feelings". And so does the Great Mother. Her 
Gospel is a fleeting and radiant universe and is to be read by 
feelings, by living into it. 

If a landscape does not laugh to us, sing itself into us or dance 
before us, it is because we do not laugh, sing or dance. Apollo's 
lyre emitted flames. 

In Judea, Jesus was life; in Samaria He was light and in 
Galilea He was the Way and Beyond. In all He was Wholeness, 
and in the parts He was spiritual virility. The three (4) parts 
of Palestine are all mental, moral and spiritual. The Great 
Mother is present in all in unlimited degree. Over all is Health, 
Purity and Salvation. 

Jesus and the Beauty of the Great Mother 

Jesu background in "the Father" is explained in the New 
Testament and His intimate relationship to Nature is described, 
but theologians have not brought out this relationship. Sporad- 
ically something has been done, but they have not cared to be 
emphatic on His intimate connection with His natural environ- 
ment and they have not dared to show .that His inspiration was 
drawn from Great Mother Nature or how the framework of His 
ministry is found in the Open. 

As the great Mystic, He was, He drew His inspiration from 
"the Ground of the Soul" like all Mystics and thus He had im- 
mediate or direct knowledge, visions and gifts, but He also, and 
as a Mystic, drew His inspiration and power from "the Ground 
of Nature" and thus He lived in constant Presence. It was from 



314 THE GREAT MOTHER 

out "the Ground of Nature" or the immediate teachings of the 
Great Mother that He "learned" His clear and direct way, 
never needing to argue intellectually or seek verifications in 
sense. And it was Nature that preserved His wonderful free- 
dom or self-praise and gave Him His sublime indifference to 
"this" world and the humility which kept Him out of all confu- 
sion. He saw how serenely all natural objects obeyed their law of 
life and did not waste life in vain desires. He not only saw this 
but drew His virtue from these facts. Jesus made Himself 
part of the Nature around Him and that determined His attitude. 
He made Himself part of Palestine where He was born. The 
soil bred Him ; He never despised it. All this reveals His method 
of life, rich for an initiation. 

The mountains of Galilea are not so rugged as those of Judea; 
they are smoother and more attractive. It is difficult anywhere 
else on the globe to find a territory of so diversified character 
as Galilea. Over Galilea lies an air of health; the people were 
hardy and brave. Most of the apostles were from Galilea. From 
the heights of Zebulon of nearly four thousand feet elevation, 
Jesus had a full view of the West of the blue-purple Mediterran- 
ean. From these heights He saw the Sea, the Great Mirror of 
the world. In the desert He felt the power of the Open. The 
two places gave Him the alphabet of the Great Mother's Song 
of Songs of her creation. 

The Ocean or the Sea is the Great Mirror. Water is closely 
connected with light and air. We are in the Sea as much as we 
are in the Air. The two are only separated by "the firmament". 

Light is a complete mystery. We know only color or light 
vibration. The sun's rays are charioteers. Jesus is a wanderer, 
a color vibration of a light mystery: the Christ. From the 
mountains of Zebulon Jesus lived into the blue of the sea and 
sky when He looked West to the lands around the Mediterranean, 
which were to be the bearers of His gospels and His revelations 
of the Mother. Below Him were green and yellow with masses 
of red and pink. Blue is a special Christ color and carries a 
peculiar message from the Great Mother. Blue was unknown 
till He came. It is not mentioned in the Rig Veda as color of the 
heavens, only as a dye. Neither do the Zend Avesta, Egypt or 
Babylon know the blue of the sky. The Homeric poems know 



the great mother 315 

the blue sea but not the blue sky. The Eddas do not know blue, 
nor is that color known in High German. Not till the Middle 
Ages is there a clear distinction between blue, green and black. 
The Chinese, however, knew of the blue sky seven hundred years 
before Christ. t 

While there was no blue color sense till late, mankind had a 
light-sense, or a sense of quality. All ancient color-names dis- 
tinguish between bright and dark, but no more. In the blue 
Jesus saw His Christ qualities reflected as apostle and prophet; 
in the green and yellow He felt Himself in His Jesus qualities 
as evangelist and pastor. Green is stirring, but not exciting and 
yellow exhilarates; these two qualities heal and teach. There 
was no disturbing red in His visions, the red of the flowers was 
lost in the greater harmonies. The blue quality preaches and 
commands. 

To understand the Universal Logos or the Christ we must 
study the Beauty-Man as well as the man of Goodness and Wis- 
dom. Too little attention has been paid to the subject. Beauty 
is being studied in the Occident and Art is its evangelist, but 
religion works more actively with the God-man than with the 
Beauty-man and that is a defect. The Beauty-Man is an in- 
carnation of Beauty of course, and Beauty is intensity cast in 
the perfect form. It yearns and strives for life and exhibits 
itself in freedom. The Beauty-Man is that single tree in the 
woods which raises its head above the forest level and greets the 
sun, the moon and the stars in the name of all the other trees. 
Beauty speaks familiarly with the earth about curves, spirals 
and wavy lines. It reveals the Great Mother's mysteries of sym- 
metry, harmony and eurythmy and shows her occult laws to be 
the norms for all development. Beauty is quality, not quan- 
tity; it alone can give form to goodness and truth. 

Hellenism revealed the Beauty-Man and Beauty. The Hebrew 
Hod, Kabod and Tiphareth are limited conceptions. The Eter- 
nal Gospel which is the Great Mother's gospel of intensity re- 
veals the Beauty-Man to the truth seeker. The Gospel is 
written in all plant and animal forms and the lines of the land- 
scape. The art mind of the old Kelts and Scandinavians knew 
the Great Mother's meaning with curved lines and spirals. 
Greeks and Romans appreciated the accanthus and the scroll. 



316 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Byzantine foliage and Christian circles and vines on golden 
grounds are familiar to art history. Impersonal they seem, but 
they contain the latent genius of the Beauty-Man and are in- 
tensely active and attractive. Love guides the chisel and stylus 
which portrays Beauty. 

By adapting and squaring the words of another to my pur- 
pose,* I will describe Beauty in relation to the philosophy of 
faith. Beauty is of course the Great Mother. 

Beauty is the creator of the world and Mankind her well-be- 
loved and chosen from eternity. Through long primeval ages 
untiringly she wooed us with most sweet persuasion. She called 
to us from pigments of flowers and berries and the gay plumage 
of winged creatures. She warmed us with sunbeams and fanned 
us with cool breezes, and smiled from the skies of summer. 
Upon green shaded banks she laid out for us soft and firm 
couches, and sighed to us from the water-courses as she passed 
by amid the songs of birds. She showed us symmetry and fitness 
in the forms of organisms, and divine order in the revolutions of 
the hours and seasons. Morning and evening she displayed to us 
her glory in the horizon from beyond the hills. At noonday she 
came down to us upon the sunbeams. 'Soul of man!' she said 
'Thou must love me : for behold, I am lovely.' Mankind for its 
part was well pleased, but being so gross, has scarcely dis- 
covered her as yet. Accordingly, mankind has paid little at- 
tention to her more solemn visitations, but continued for a long 
time diverting itself with trifles, of shape, and color, and motion, 
and the rudiments of music. Mankind has been so pleased with 
these earthly mistresses that it has forgotten its benefactress and 
the true mistress of its soul. Mankind has lived with earthly 
wives and been concerned with the offspring, the nation and the 
country and learned too little about the spiritual. But now 
Beauty is becoming manifest and mankind is at last inquiring 
about her. 

It is Beauty which Jesus reads in the Open when He sees 
color. And color formulates His fourfold office. 

If Beauty has that universality I claim it has, it must be found 
in the fourfoldness of the Temple. And it is found there. 



* Comp. B. Brewster: The Philosophy of Faith, N. Y., 1913. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 317 

Beauty is apostolic or "foundation," viz. it gives delight in and 
for itself. It is what the Greeks called Kosmos or Order, Plan, 
Purpose. Therefore when objects come together in such har- 
mony that we perceive their intimate ground, we have found 
Beauty or the Ground we can build upon ; we have then posses- 
sion of the Form which can enlarge us and infill us with power 
to do great things. We are then in the Mother's Presence and 
have the light which lights every man who comes into the world. 
But let us not be deceived; such objects are more than art ob- 
jects. They are rather correspondences. A landscape is really 
never local; it is always universal. The sun, moon, sky, sea, 
light, shade, perspective are always more than they appear. They 
always speak a universal language and draw us on to the Beyond. 
The human body and soul are really not individual, if our eyes 
are open. It is not the Madonna we see, but the mother and 
child. It is not this or that particular Japanese lacquered tray 
or vase which we admire; it is the craft that harmonized the 
bizarre, its power. 

Beauty is also Prophesy or that imperative voice which does 
not argue, but simply declares or proclaims and nothing more is 
necessary. When the Great Mother touches a soul with Beauty, 
it leaps upward and forward, in and out of itself and without ar- 
guments, it proclaims laws and spiritual relationships never be- 
fore realized or even suspected. In a moment the soul is ma- 
tured and knows all mysteries. Beauty may well be called the 
ground plan and purpose of creation ; the harmony of power and 
wisdom, all living and organic. Let us trust the magic spell of 
prophesy that comes by Beauty. Beauty is a pilot trained in 
the eternal laws for sailing to the ports of the Eternal Mother. 
Beauty reveals a truer and deeper knowledge than moral or in- 
tellectual judgments. Beauty is also Evangelist or that living 
appeal to our image-making faculty which is irresistible, because 
it is organic and full of the Great Mother's warm Nature. In- 
tellectual study and learning is slow and wearisome, but the living 
Word touches us to the quick. It is so human, so personal and 
direct. There is Beauty in the living Word; it is its electric 
force and the power of its ministry. The senses may deceive, 
but the Word can not. It calls out the native beauty of the 
soul and elevates all it touches. And comes from the Presence. 



318 THE GREAT MOTHER 

Beauty is also Spirituality or Pastoral care of the soul. Spirit- 
uality is beyond all the limitations which bind intellect and will. 
It can not be pointed at and shown to be here or there but it is 
most real and gives the person or thing its value. It is mo- 
bility. Running water has charms; a stagnant pool has 
none; so with Spirituality; its forms flow into each other and 
it flows into all forms if not barred by force or brutality. It has 
the organic quality of Beauty and illuminates our existence. "To 
see things in their beauty is to see them in their truth" is a correct 
statement, because they in their Beauty are of the Mother and 
in their Truth they are also of the Mother. 

Beauty has now been shown in the fourfoldness of the Great 
Mother. But lest my reader be deceived, let me add that the 
fourfoldness of the Great Mother is no mechanical affair. It is 
geometrical, to be sure, but her fourfold beauty is like a flowing 
river, like running water or birds wheeling in the air. Her 
beauty takes Art form for the sake of manifestation, but avoids 
the circumscribed. She is rather asymmetrical than symmetrical. 
Too much regularity is painful. Exactness is mechanical and 
necessary. Beauty is free and spontaneous. Nature is more 
beautiful than Art, because she can not be enclosed in a shape, 
in a system or in an intellectual thought. There is Art, which is 
Nature's Art and has Nature's benediction upon it. The Milesian 
Aphrodite and Michael Angelo's Aurora are such Nature-art. 
And so is the Madonna di San Sisto. 

The Milesian Aphrodite is Mother Nature as Foundation, 
Apostle. Michael Angelo's Aurora is Mother Nature as Evan- 
gelist. Raphael's Madonna is the Great Mother as Prophet. In 
all three there is something of the Pastoral quality. 

Why Did Jesus Call no Women to be Apostles? 

This question was asked by a woman who knew of my writing 
this book. The question is proper and easily answered. Jesus 
worked in the Christministry and that ministry is specially mas- 
culine, hence He naturally drew His helpers from the masculine 
sphere. But all He does and is, is of the Jesus-quality viz., of 
Love nature, drawn from the Eternal Mother. He is, so to say, 
His own Mother ; He does her work and that work is manifested 
in masculine forms. His work is done by apostles, but He lives 



THE GREAT MOTHER 319 

among women. His teaching and healing ministry was carried 
on among women as freely as among men. His means of sup- 
port appears to have been derived chiefly from women. It was 
the custom of the day. Women were prepared to perform the 
last offices for the dead on the body of Jesus. There is no evi- 
dence for nor against women having been among the Seventy. 
Women were present on the day of Pentecost and must have 
been partakers of the gift, for Luke reports that the tongues 
"sat upon each of them," viz. all present. At Corinth women 
prophesied. Paul held that "in Christ there can be no male or 
female." (Gal. 3:28). 

Jesus and His First Disciples 

Jesus acted Beauty, I have said. The Great Mother was the 
power back of His actions. Did He act Beauty in the calling of 
His first disciples? He certainly did and the four were clearly 
Nature-men or Mystics. He called Peter and Andrew ; James and 
John. Peter was the active, the practical man and the founda- 
tion stone ; the apostolic character. John was "the disciple whom 
Jesus loved". It was he who had the apocalyptic vision of the 
church or Jesu Kingdom. He was the prophetic thunder and 
the pensive thought of his master. Andrew was, as his name in- 
dicates, "the man" par excellence and as such the Evangelist. 
No one can do evangelistic work except in manliness and virtue. 
And James, who was the first martyr, was the type of that 
righteousness which is spirituality or other worldliness. There 
is then no doubt about their Beauty types of the Great Mother or 
about their offices. Why did they follow Jesus and why did they 
leave their work so readily? The answer is easy and quickly 
given. Being Nature-Mystics, they at once recognized Him as a 
living stream of Beauty, the sea in a personal form, and the 
work they were called to do became the spiritual correspondence 
of fishing. Their perceptions re-generated them. Jesus called 
them because He saw them at once as members of Himself and 
His ministry. They and He both saw each other spiritually and 
that was the Great Mother's work, of course. 

Jesus as a Teacher of Art and Beauty 
It is a common objection that Jesus did not teach anything on 



320 the; great mother 

the subject of the Beautiful and Art. The objection has no true 
ground to rest on. It has only a foundation in ecclesiasticism. 
If I can show my readers how thoroughly Jesu actions corre- 
spond to Art, I shall thereby have proved Him to be an Art 
teacher. We know Beauty and Art by its effect upon us. 

What is the artistic spirit? It is the spirit that delights in 
the truth of Nature or Spirit and not in the rules and precepts 
of men; it is to be unconventional, to do away with rules and 
unities as abominations, because they make Art lifeless and 
wither the soul. To an artist it is a sin to substitute the rules 
of men for the worship of Nature or Spirit. 

Christ is just of such a spirit. He protests against the Phari- 
sees for teaching the commandments of men instead of the 
great facts of life and the soul. He taught always that men are 
not under the law but under the Spirit and the truth of Nature. 
In that respect He taught exactly as the artist does. Neither 
would Christ have any one servilely copy Nature, but have us 
enter into her spirit by the free worship of the heart. Like the 
true artist, Jesus declared that the inside not the outside must 
be cleansed. A corrupt tree can not bear good fruit. No one is 
an artist who does not live the Inner-Life and in communion 
with the ideal or the seven spirits of God. The principle behind 
Art and morality is the same ; Jesus and the true artist drink from 
the same fountain: the quiet place of the soul or the Great 
Mother. When Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman and told 
her not to worship either on her own country's mountains or at 
Jerusalem, but to worship in Spirit, He gave expression to the 
artist's law of freedom. No artist will tolerate a second-hand 
worship of Nature; he means the Great Mother. He will not 
allow us to first ask what the great ones say about it. He de- 
mands that we — free from hypocricy — follow our own heart and 
worship spontaneously and in the fulness of our heart, the mo- 
ment Nature or the Mother calls upon us to do so. And Jesus 
said "They shall no longer say each man to his brother, know 
the Beautiful, but they shall all know it, from the least to the 
greatest." Do not lean upon an other man. Truth and Beauty 
can carry us. They are "the two everlasting arms underneath." 
They are the two trinities on the side of the Great Mother. 

While the artist is to be absorbed in Beauty, he is not to lose 



THE) GREAT MOTHER 321 

sanity or self-control. Neither will Jesus allow us to lapse into 
lawlessness. Jesus was ever quite as passionate as any artist. 
Both let themselves be directed by life's great currents ; they do 
not stay in the narrow coves or stray into little private back- 
waters of their own* While Jesus and the true artist are pas- 
sionate, they are nevertheless sober and demand rest. Jesus dis- 
tinctly invited us to come to Him for rest, and, every artist looks 
for balance and harmony which is exactly the same quality. 

Paul speaks much about God's preference for the weak things 
and says that the weak shall overcome the strong, the foolish 
the wise, etc. Christ looked upon Nature in the same way. 
But, what is the meaning of being weak when Paul speaks of it 
in the way, I have just mentioned? And what does Jesus mean 
when He says that the splendor of Solomon was not to be com- 
pared with the Beauty of a flower and the fall of a sparrow is 
noted by the Heavenly Father? Both mean the Spiritual, which 
in the world is always called weak and insignificant. What 
worldly person would consider the killing of a sparrow? The 
spiritual do not kill sparrows. Worldliness has no conception of 
the Small as being just as important a factor in the Cosmic 
Economy as the Great. There can be no Infinitely Great with- 
out the Infinitely Small. Both Jesus and the artist have a sense 
which the husbandman has not; the husbandman sows his seed; 
"it springs and grows up, he knoweth not how". But the artist 
and Jesus both live and have their being in the mysteries of life 
and its growth and that is why they are our teachers and media- 
tors. 

And we understand what Paul means by God's preference for 
the weak things. The seeming unreality of the Inner-Life is 
that very strength which overcomes the foolish, the strong, etc. 

Weakness then is the method of the Inner-Life. An artist is 
not an ascetic in the horrid old sense and introduced anew by 
the ignorant ; neither was Jesus. As a matter of course an artist 
can not be an ascetic because he deals in sensuous facts. Forms 
and shapes, flesh and blood and passionate motions are his field 
of work and interpretations. In our own day we are no more 
frightened by the old tales about the dangerous human nature. 
When we are with the Great Mother and in her Christorder we 
are in anastasis, viz., in the resurrection, "dead and freed from 




322 THE GREAT MOTHER 

sin"; and are in "the eternal life", though still here on earth. 
We are no more weaklings led by unscrupulous priests in whose 
interest it is to restrain us. We know what self-control is. We 
revere life; we do not fear it. We turn our passions into pro- 
moters. We do not seek "escapes", we seek "attainments". 
Jesus was no ascetic either. His enemies accused Him of eat- 
ing and drinking and seeking the good things, yet He was never 
intemperate. He knew as well as the true artist the value of 
restraint and of self-limitation. As little as He indulged so lit- 
tle did He advocate rites and ceremonies; He declared that the 
"Sabbath was made for man" and by that He absolved us from 
any religion which is made in the interest of a god. He advised 
rather to "seek the kingdom of God first" and that advice com- 
ing from an artist would be "go down to first principles". They 
both have "meat" the world knows nothing about. That "meat" 
is spirituality and high communion. And that is why their in- 
fluence is so eminent and redemptive. They, Jesus and 
the artist, live in the Whole, the Good, the True and 
the Beautiful. Early Christian art was weak and devoid of 
beauty but surely Jesus is not responsible for that. It was a re- 
sult of the horror which the early believers entertained against 
pagan worship, processions, sacrifices and festivities ; all of which 
they looked upon as deadly snares — and that was unnecessary. 
Had the early Christians developed the inherent power and truth 
and beauty of their belief, all those pagan abominations would 
have died of themselves. But fanatic priests declared for war 
and made their artists create the very opposite of what Paganism 
offered. Where Paganism offered joyous processions, the priests 
introduced funeral marches and dreary torchlight parades at night 
ending in wailing, flaggellations and ascetic practices. Where 
pagan worship gloried in the Beauties of the human body and did 
all it could to exalt it, for instance in creating occasions for 
great assemblies to see its beauty, the church people did all they 
could to hide it and dress it in most hideously shaped clothes. 
They emasculated the body, they starved it and spoiled its ap- 
pearance with stripes and scourges. Nothing of this can be 
charged against Jesus, though He has been accused of being be- 
hind it all. 

The following tale is to the point. It illustrates the attitude 



THE GREAT MOTHER 323 

of ecclesiasticism. It is admirably described by Browning. The 
Prior directed Fra Lippo Lippi : 

Your business is not to, catch men with show, 

With homage to the perishable clay, 

But lift them over it, ignore it all, 

Make them forget there's such a thing as flesh. 

Your business is to paint the souls of men — 

Man's soul 

Give us no more of the body than shows soul ! 

The trouble is that the hypocrites do not see the body clearly, 
widely and deeply enough. Let them learn from Mrs. Brown- 
ing's "Aurora Leigh" : "paint the body well, you paint a soul by 
implication, like the grand first Master." Let them study 
Raphael in whom the subjective and the objective artist were 
one. Raphael was a full-orbed artist, making the ideal appear 
more real and the real more ideal. In my indignation at this 
ignorance I exclaim with Fra Lippo Lippi in his answer to the 
Prior's dictum : 'paint no more body than shows soul" : 

— The beauty and the wonder and the power, 

The shapes of things, their colors, lights, and shades, 

Changes, surprises, — (and) God made it all! 

— For what? Do you feel thankful, ay or no, 

For this fair town's face, yonder river's line, 

The mountain round it and the sky above, 

Much more the figures of man, woman, child, 

These are the frame to? What's it all about? 

To be passed over, despised? or dwelt upon, 

Wondered at? Oh, this last of course! — you say. 

But why not do as well as say, — paint these 

Just as they are, careless what comes of it? 

God's works — paint any one, and count it crime 

To let a truth slip. 

This world's no blot for us, 

Nor blank; it means intensely, and means good; 

To find its meaning is my meat and drink. 



324 THE GREAT MOTHER 

The world was no blot for Jesus. It was the Mother's Presence 
to Him. She had made it for Him and by Him and He was its 
Logos. 

Jesus the Christ taught Beauty. Indeed He gave Beauty where 
the Greeks had only given Art. Instead of Dryads and Naiads 
He showed the world that the flowers of the field and the birds 
of the air were the Mother's nurslings ; that harvest time was her 
gift and seed time, her promise ; that rain and sun fell upon all 
without personal distinctions or favors. As a result of that, 
the Beauty there is in the sky, the air, in earth and the sea, was 
revealed and that created those sympathetic feelings which are 
so necessary for art productions. Thus Beauty followed directly 
in Christ's footsteps. 

To Horace the rose was merely a scented plaything, but to 
Wordsworth, bred in the Christspirit, even the meanest flower 
came as a message from the Great Mother and laden with 
thoughts too deep for tears. 

Jesu method of teaching was not that of a logician or preacher. 
He painted human pictures. That was His art. He made His 
listeners see themselves pass before their own eyes by a vivid 
use of daily human acts and thoughts. Paul followed the same 
method; all Paul's teachings, by some taken so terribly literal, 
are poetic imagery and his words should be seen dramatically and 
not read as syllogisms. See for instance how his fancy plays with 
the idea of baptism, death and resurrection and with the life 
of Jesus. He is not teaching philosophy or theology, he is a poet 
and paints scenery suggesting life. This method is the Mother's 
method everywhere. She is indirect and suggestive ; she appeals 
to our aspirations in order to make us do her will which is really 
our own will and the idea of our life. The strength and correct- 
ness of this method is proved by the fact that the revivals which 
followed the presence of Jesus were the revivals of the desire to 
live. 



THE GREAT MOTHER 325 

L'envoy 

To tell the whole story about the Great Mother is impossible. 
As much as seemed important and useful has been told and relates 
to the three so called "bodies" : the physical, the psychic and the 
mental. But, no matter how much more were told or related 
better than I could do it, every narrative or discourse or revela- 
tion would fall very short if it did not frankly declare that the 
Great Mother is after all not to be found in her fulness in either 
of them. 

The Great Mother is Spirituality and to be conceived Spirit- 
ually. 

The life that feels most of her Being is Spirit and Love. 

To say that She is Spirituality and to be spiritually conceived 
is to say that unless the present world puts itself under her tui- 
tion and under the guidance of her priestesses, it can not know 
her nor will she take the people of to-day into her arms. It is 
true, She lives for the world and Her tenderness is inscrutable, 
but the world can not know her unless it denies the blinding 
forms of self. 

The lesson of my book is therefore that my readers shall seek 
the Great Mother's priestesses, the passionate pilgrim sjaiLg ternity. 
They stand ready to teach and to help to lift the veil of lies and 
the cosmic burden. The future seems hopeless unless the Moth- 
er's call is obeyed ! What can and will my reader do in the line 
of an organized effort? 




INDEX 



Aditi, 264. 

Air, 200 ff. 

A-I-M, 88. 

Amiel, quot. 47. 

Anaxagoras, quot. 26. 

Ancients, The, 45. 

Angela of Foligno, 82. 

Animals and Plants, 212 f. 

Animism, 73 f f. 

Apollo, 28. 

Apostles, The, 318 f. 

Aphrodite, 45, 64, 141, 143 f., 275. 

April, 233 f. 

Arnold, Math., 17. 

Art, 127 ff., 320 ff., as Yoga, 163, 

169. 
Artemis (Diana), 276. 
Aserah, 56. 
Aspasia, 67. 
Aspiration, 59 ff., 70. 
Athene, 200 f., 274 f. 
Attainment, 2, 3. 
August, 239 f . 
Augustine, St., 186, 244. 
Autumn, 224 ff. 

Beck, a, 78. 

Beauty, 70 ff., 127 ff., 313 ff., 

319 ff- 
Being, the Great Mother, 254. 
Bell, Ch., quot. 118. 
Bernhardt of Clairvaux, 190. 
Bohme, J., 158, quot. 187. 
Bonaventura, quot. 187. 
Botany, teaching, 155. 
Brooke, S. A., quot. 323. 
Browning, Mrs., quot. 323. 
Browning, R., quot. 9, 323. 
Bruno, Giordano, quot. 191. 
Byron, quot. 183, 192, 205. 
Buckley, Arabella, quot. 24. 

Ceres, 45. 
Chaos, 45, 265. 
Chateaubriand, quot. 192. 
Child and Childbearing, 46 ff. 
Christ, Christians, 53, 243. 
Christianity, 25. 
Christmas Vibrations, 216. 
Cithaeron, Mt, 268. 
Civilization, 43. 
Colors, 164, 197 ff., 314 ff. 
Conception, 2. 



Concilio, the Rev. J. D., quot. 

292 ff. 
Corot, 161. 

Dance, 214 f f . 
Death, 120 ff., 257, 265. 
December, 227 f. 
Demeter-Percephone, 278. 
Demiurgos, 147. 
Design in Nature, 6. 
Diana, 277. 
Dionysius, 31. 
Diremption, 46, 50. 
Dirt, 123. 
Disciples, 319. 
Divinity, feminine, 1. 
Diirer, 195, 301. 

Earth, 205 f f., 265. 

Earthhour, The, 206 ff. 

Easter, 217 ff. 

Ebal, Mt., 269. 

Ecclesiasticism, 290. 

El, Eloah, Elohim, etc., 280. 

Eliscu, E. R., quot. 87 ff. 

Emerson, R. W., quot. 101 f f., 184. 

Emotions, 46. 

Energy, 146. 

Epictetus, quot. 118. 

Erebus, Night, 265. 

Erinnyes, 271. 

"Escape," 2. 

Eternally-Feminine, The, 2, 29 f f., 

36, 39, 48, 304. 
Euphorion, 167. 
Evil, 25, 114 ff. 

Fates, The, 49. 

Father God, 313. 

Father-idea, The, 147. 

Faust, 167. 

February, 230 f . 

Femininity, 45, 55. 

Fiona Macleod, quot. 96 ff. 

Fire, 208 ff., 273. 

Fiske, V., quot. 28. 

Flesh, 38. 

Flora, 270. 

Flowers, 306. 

Fountain of Youth, 171. 

Fourfoldness, 195 ff. 

Fraetas, W. F, quot. 197 ff. 

Francis, St., quot. 187 ff. 



328 



INDEX 



Freedom, 176 ff. 
Frothingham, B., quot. 54. 
Fuji-no-Yama, 85. 

Gaia-Rhea, 279. 

Genius, 268. 

Gerizim, Mt., 269. 

Gilder, R. W., quot. II. 

God, the Workmaster, 7. 

Goethe, quot. 24, 26, 29 ff., 53, 
80, 194. 

Graces, 268 f f. 

Great Mother, The, 4, 5, 7, 10, 21, 
30, 36, 38, 77, 80, 82, 89, 123, 
126 ff., 199 ff., 208, 261. 

Hearn, Lafcadio, quot. 116. 
Hebe, 270. 
Hebrews, The, 56. 
Hecate, 267. 
Hela, Hell, Hades, 124. 
Helen, 65 ff., 167 ff. 
Helicon, Mt., 268. 
Heliodorus, 243. 
Heraclitus, 208. 
Here, 275. 
Hermetic Books, 84. 
H-M-M, 89. 
Hestia (Vesta), 277. 
Holy Spirit, feminine, 40. 
Humanity, 13, 53. 
Hunt, Wm., quot. 158. 
Huxley, T., quot. 22, 27. 
Hypostasis (Personality), 74. 

Illusions, 114. 
Image-making power, 162. 
India, 52. 

Indian Maiden, story, 83. 
Individuality, modern, 251. 
Inner-Life, 6, 18, 20, 48. 
Irving, Edw., quot. 249 ff. 
Isis, 262 f. 

Jahveh, 56. 

January, 229. 

Jean Paul (Richter), 193. 

Jefferies, R., quot. 100 ff. 

Jellalladdin, quot. 257. 

Jesus, 53, In the Open, 304 ff. 

Job, 282 ff. 

Julian, the Apostate, 186. 

July, 238 f. 

June, 236 f. 

Juno, 276 f. 



Kabbalah, i( 
308 ff. 



and Palestine, 



Kali, 216, 304. 
Karup Heath, 170. 
Kingsley, Chas., quot. 155. 
Krause, K. C. T., quot. 9. 

Landscape, The, 247. 

Law, 56. 

Leaves, 223 f f. 

Leah, 151. 

Leibnitz, 120. 

Leopardi, quot. 123. 

Life, 62. 

Light, 152 ff., 219 ff., 314 f. 

Lines, 146 ff. 

Logos, 75. 

Lopez, Gregorio, 191. 

Love, 82 ff., 141 ff. 

McCreery, J. L-, quot. 122. 

Madonnas, 299 ff. 

Man, 54. 

Maple, The, 84. 

March, 231. 

Marcus Aurelius, quot. 28. 

Martyrdom of Man, 117. 

Mary, 72, 291 ff. 

Masculine, The, 1, 34. 

Matriarchy, 44. 

Maurice de Guerin, quot. 109 f f. 

May, 234. 

Maya, 260. 

Mills, J. S., quot. 15 ff. 

Milton, J., quot. 12. 

Mother, Motherhood, 87, 119. 

Mother right, 42. 

Mothering the Race, 87 ff. 

Mother-goddesses, 45, 263 ff., 300. 

Morgan, Lewis, quot. 42. 

Mozoomdar, quot. 76, 254, 258. 

Muses, The, 49, 66 ff., 268. 

Mystics and Mysticism, 2, 6, 14, 27. 

Mythology, 260 f. 

Naiads, 277. 
Natural Man, The, 7. 
Nature, adaptation to, 14. 

conquest, 17. 

cruel, 15. 

feeling, 249. 

and Great Mother, 20. 

in harmony with, 17. 

Hebrew view of, 279. 

Mystics and Mysticism, 
23, 149, 184 ff. 

Names, 2, 6, 7, 9 f., 21, 26. 
29, 45, Si, 55, 82, 272. 

People, 13. 

Poetry, 90 ff. 



INDEX 



329 



Nature Spirits, 214. 

Where and how to meet, 
18. 

Worship, 12, 252 f. 
Nehemiah, 19. 
Nereids, 277. 
New Testament, 300. 
Night, The, 265. 
Nippur, 5. 
Nornes, The, 271. 
November, 241 f. 
Numa Pamphilius, 69. 
Nymphs, 68, 266. 

Ocean, The, 314. 
October, 240 f. 
O'Donnell, C. L., quot. 206. 
Old Testament, 280. 
Oliphant, Mrs., quot. 55. 
Open Court, quot. 32. 
Open, Life in the, 44. 
Ossianic landscape, 248. 
Ozanam, quot. 190. 

Pain, 25, 118 f. 

Palestine, 308. 

Parmenides, 26. 

Patriarchy, 44. 

Paul, St., 309. 

Perceptions, 1. 

Persephone, 278. 

Person, Personality, 73 ff. 

Pheidias, 65. 

Phoenix, 224 ff. 

Pine, The, 86. 

Pneuma, 75. 

Poe, E. A., quot. 81. 

Poetry, 77 ff. 

Pomeroy, E., quot. 116. 

Praxiteles, 65, 144. 

Presence, The, 10, 18, 161, 281. 

Proserpine, 278 f. 

Proteus, 121, 272. 

Psalms, The, 289. 

Pygmalion and Galathea, 160, 

165 ff- 
Pythagoras, 197. 

Rachael, 151. 

Raymund of Sabunde, quot. 187. 

Rebirth, 169. 

Reconciliation, 169, 174 ff. 

Regeneration, 169. 

Religions, ancient, 61 ff. 

Religion and Revelation, 182 ff. 

Renaissance, 73 it., 144 ff. 

Romanticism, ioi. 

Rome, 70 f. 



Rousseau, J. J., 13. 
Rousseau, the painter, 157. 
Royce, T., quot. 184. 

Schelling, quot. 45. 

Schiller, quot. 25, 28, 186, 209. 

Schlegel, quot. 12. 

Scriptures, how to read, 2. 

Scylla and Charybdis, 274, 278. 

Senses, The, and Sensations, 9. 26. 

185. 
September, 240 f. 
Seton, G. G., quot. 82 ff. 
Sex, 38 f. 

Shakespeare, quot. 173 ff. 
Shechinah, 56, 281. 
Shelley, quot. 25, 193. 
Shrines, Holy, 245. 
Shulamite, The, 151. 
Sibyls, 69, 270. 
Sirens, 277. 
Socrates, quot. 27 f . 
Solitude, 18. 
Somnus (Sleep), 266. 
Sophocles, 168. 
Soul-stuff, 83. 
Sphinx, The, 15, 63 f. 
Splendor, 147. 
Stillness, 19. 
Stolberg, F., quot. 194. 
Styx, 267. 
Sufism, 255. 
Sulzer, J. C., quot. 187. 
Summer, 222 ff. 
Swinburne, quot. 98 ff., 208. 
Symbols, 45. 

Tao-Teh-King, quot. 269. 
Tersteegen, quot. 19. 
Tertulian, quot. 12. 
Thomas i. Kempis, quot. 8 f. 
Thoreau, quot. vi, 9, 105 ff. 
Torah, The, 56. 
Turgenieff, quot. 16. 
Tyndal, quot. 26. 

Ubi tu Caius, ibi ego Caia, 69. 
Unitive Way, 2, 3. 

Veil, behind the, 26, 28. 

Venus of Melos, 65, 144 ff. 

Vesta, 69. 

Vincentius of Beauvais, 190. 

Virgin, The, 73. 

Visions, 12. 

Visions of the Great Mother, 254. 

Vital Force, 82. 



NOV 28 1913 



330 



INDEX 



Water, 202 f. 

Water goddesses, 277. 

Whitman, W., quot. 37, 107, 153. 

Wild Nature, 243 f. 

Wilhelm Meister, quot. 26, 117. 

Withers, quot. 95. 

Woman, 37 ff., 48 f., 52, 54 ff., 

59, 62 f., 85, 87. 
Woman Question, 36, 47, 52. 
Woods Hutchinson, quot. 124. 
Wordsworth, quot. 78, 90 ff., 159 

ff., 248 ff. 



Workmaster, The, 147. 
World Soul, 75. 

Xenephon, quot. 27. 

Ygdrasil, 222. 

Zeno, quot. 157 f. 
Zodiac and color, 198. 



